A/N: I just want to say a special thanks to everyone who reached out after my inner critic decided to go completely psycho over some feedback. What I said in my added author's note of the previous chapter stands. This story is and always was about more than just Emily and Alison.

And my inner critic needs to get out of quarantine, like…yesterday.

Please enjoy (or bitch at me like I do?) the Shakespearean length.


Chapter 41:

Songs of Innocence

Alison was five years old the first time she went ice skating. Her grandmother had taken her to Rockefeller Center. She had been a natural. She remembered balancing on the blades and zipping around with the older kids.

She went ice skating in Maine once out on a lake when she was staying with her grandparents' family friends when she was eight. She remembered it being really different than New York. The dark murky waters below the frozen block of ice added an element of danger to it.

Her grandparents had told her not to go out past the warning signs. The big red and white blocky signs were out where the ice was dangerously thin. She remembered wondering what happened to all the animals in the winter time.

She slid around on her skates without a care in the world, staring at the dark waters. She had skated beyond the signs, testing her boundaries.

She remembered the thrill she had gotten when she crossed the line. The rush. The excitement. She remembered the way her skates made scratching noises against the ground. She remembered the precise lines the blades left on the ice.

She didn't hear the crunching noises beneath her feet, but she did remember her grandparents yelling at her that she'd gone too far.

The earth moved underneath her. She remembered the way the ice looked, like perfectly broken little lines that were drawn with a pencil.

She'd watched in fascination, and confusion. It felt like it was happening in slow motion.

The bottom fell out. Then the water rushed up around her as she'd plunged into the frigid lake water.

It wasn't the cold she remembered the most. It was the way the underwater plants had scratched against her tights. It felt like gnarly witch fingers trying to rip her clothing off.

Her head went under. Her body felt like it would sink forever, like she would never be able to come up for air. She remembered thinking she should open her mouth to scream, but when she did the dirty icy water burned her mouth.

The waters were swallowing her whole. She was sure she was going to die, but then she felt a pair of rough hands against her shoulders. Her grandfather had yanked her out of the water and away from the thin ice.

She was conscious. She was crying. But no matter how hard she cried she still felt like she was underwater and she couldn't breathe. She kicked and thrashed and screamed.

The intensity of the cold hurt so badly it felt like she was on fire. She was shivering violently, her teeth chattering. She couldn't get warm.

She had the same exact feeling when she jolted awake in the basement of the hospital in a dark cold refrigerator.

She felt a shooting pain in her head. When she opened her eyes it was pitch black. She couldn't see anything, but she could feel her spine pressed against a hard steely surface.

The frigid air burned her eyes. Her lips were dry. The skin on her hands was so chapped that it was swollen and starting to crack on her knuckles.

She tried to move, but her space was constricted. She lifted her arms, bent at the elbow. She pressed her palms against the solid surface above her.

She was in a box.

No, not a box.

A tomb.

The panic set in immediately. She was trapped in the morgue. If she didn't suffocate she would surely freeze to death in the mortuary cabinet.

"Help!" she screamed. She tried to flip around to no avail. "HELP!"

She twisted her arm and started banging against the door. She dragged her hand across the slick frozen metal and scratched wildly as tears started streaming down her face. She clawed at the surface like a wild animal, breaking two of her nails.

The tears stuck to her face. She started to hyperventilate. The more she breathed the more the air burned her lungs. Her teeth started chattering. Her hands felt like they were starting to swell, like little pins were pricking them. Her skin felt like it was on fire, which was strange since the air was so cold.

"Somebody help me!" She cried. "Can't anyone hear me? PLEASE!"

How often did doctors and staff check the morgue? Could they even hear her through the thick metal door?

She couldn't get over the fact that she was lying on a slab that had probably held many bodies before her.

That's what she'd be soon.

A body.

She could feel herself slowing down. Her body felt like it was shutting down. She had to force herself to concentrate on her breathing.

She closed her eyes and thought about Emily and the baby. Emily cradling Autumn, kissing her head, nursing her. There was something special about watching Emily nurse her. It was so peaceful to watch them connect.

Emily was the most beautiful mother that Alison had ever seen. And Autumn was the most precious baby. She loved them both with all of her heart.

Thinking about them gave her a second wind.

She started kicking her feet against the top of the cold locker.

She thought of Emily. Of Autumn. She thought about her brother. She thought about her friends. She even thought about her miserable excuses for parents. She thought about her future. About her dreams.

She thought about how far she'd come to be with Emily…how hard she'd fought for their family. How much she'd grown. How much growing she had left to do.

I'm only eighteen. I don't want to die.

She had far too much living left to do.

"HELP!"

She thought about how brave Emily had been throughout her pregnancy. How strong she'd been. Emily had made it through almost twenty-four hours of labor without giving up. She had taught her something about resolve.

Alison fought to stay conscious. She knew if she fell asleep it was over. She'd never see Emily and Autumn again.

Autumn Violet Fields. She heard Emily's voice in her head.

She had banked the memory of the first time she'd heard their baby's name.

Their baby.

"I can't believe she's ours," Emily had said.

She was Autumn's mom now. She had to get out. She had to live. Her girlfriend and their child needed her.

She couldn't bear to think about what she'd miss. She could see flashes of their future. She could see Autumn's future. The first time she giggled. Sitting up on her own. Rolling over on to her belly. Bouncing in a bouncer, working her chubby little legs. Trying solid food for the first time. Her first word. Alison just knew her first word would be Mama.

The flashes started getting faster. Autumn standing on her own. Her wobbly first steps into Emily's arms. Her first birthday, smashing her small hands into the cake and smearing it all over her face.

Learning to read. Learning to write. Bedtime stories. Playdates. Sliding down the slide at the playground. Cheers of "higher mommy" while being pushed on the swingset. Her first day of kindergarten.

It would all go by in a flash. And she couldn't miss it. She wouldn't miss it.

She wanted to be by Emily's side through it all. She just knew that they would find a place together. A big place with a backyard where Autumn could play. They would get engaged and plan a wedding, making sure to include their daughter.

The wedding would be beautiful. The curly-headed bright-eyed little girl would steal the show, dancing down the aisle in her designer flower girl dress.

She'd wear a long flowing white dress. Jason would walk her down the aisle. Emily would be in a tux, a sexy sexy tux. They'd exchange "I dos" and they'd both cry, and then they'd tease each other for crying. And Autumn would tug on her dress and beg to be picked up so she could be with her mommies.

Her throat started to burn. The tears in her eyes were crusting over. Her body was shutting down. She could feel it.

"Emily." She croaked. She closed her eyes, her body shuddering violently.

The visions of her family disappeared.

She was back under the ice again, thrashing wildly. She continued to bash her hands against the cold metal around her. She was slipping away, but she wasn't going to give up without a fight.

o ~ O ~ o

Alison's pleas were falling on deaf ears. Nick had made sure of that. He'd watched the morgue for days. It was seldom checked. Even if she woke up no one would hear her screams. The soundproof walls were made to withstand the sounds of bonesaws. They were lined with thick padding so the smells of autopsies wouldn't seep out into the hallways.

He though he'd hit her hard enough that she wouldn't wake up.

He'd underestimated her.

He was reading his brother's autopsy report. It had been kept out of the public because Wilden's death was part of an ongoing investigation into the charges that had been brought against him. The families suing were looking at his assets, and the police were still investigating to see if anyone else was involved in Wilden's crimes.

Nick still hadn't been able to figure out how Emily and Alison had been able to get the evidence of his crimes to the NYPD so quickly after Darren had attacked them in the hotel.

There were a lot of things about what happened to his brother that didn't make sense. The shock of him being sent to jail, followed by the grief of his death had thrown him off-balance.

He had been obsessing over the events leading up to his brother's death since it happened.

He'd heard Emily and Alison joking about having him killed after their court date.

"The idea of a hit-man has crossed my mind." Alison had been so brazen about it.

He'd been curious about how they'd been able to pull it off. He had been unable to get the full report. The public forums had been redacted because of the investigation.

After he locked Alison in the mortuary cabinet he'd gone in search of the report to see for himself what his brother's final moments had been like. He had a morbid fascination with finding out what Darren's last hours had been like.

He'd hacked the computers easily. After he printed out the files he'd slipped out of the hospital and disappeared into the visitor parking garage. He sat in the dark structure in his car with the overhead light on reading the report like it was a suspense novel.

He got a sense of poetic justice in knowing that Alison was taking her final breaths as he read about how his brother took his.

But the more he read the harder it was for him to understand. He struggled to put it all together.

The time of death was the first red flag. It stood out only because it was at a time when Alison and Emily were at Alison's house. Alone. He'd been surveilling them.

He scanned through the document several times, mouthing the words, as if that would make it make sense. He'd spent his entire life looking for answers, but it seemed like he always ended up with more questions than answers.

The autopsy was like decoding a mystery that he didn't want to end. The more he read the more clear it was that he was not going to like the ending.

He became engrossed in the report, obsessively eyeing every word carefully.

Ligature marks above thyroid tissue consistent with asphyxiation. Gross Carotid Artery damage. Cervical vertebra fracture. Complicated cricoid and thyroid fractures.

"Asphyxiation." Nick uttered angrily.

He'd known that much. Word on the street was that Darren had killed himself because he couldn't live with the guilt of what he'd done to those girls. But Nick knew he wasn't suicidal, not even after he'd been arrested.

He felt his stomach churning as he read in gruesome detail what his brother had looked like when he'd been found.

The next thing that caught his eye was the mention of red fibers against his fingertips.

Red linens? Transfer residue from clothing?

Nick flipped to the next page, where a tiny dime bag had samples of the fibers. They were nearly invisible to the naked eye, but on the following page the microscopic images of them had been blown up.

Nick stared. He'd seen the coloring before. On a coat.

A single blonde hair was found in dissection of the throat. Likely inhaled via air circulation?

Red coat. Blonde hair. And it couldn't have been Alison.

Traces of ink observed on the victim's fingers matching ink on suicide note found with the body.

Nick knew what he was reading, but he still couldn't believe it.

It was what he found on the last page that painted the full picture.

Toxicology results indicate dangerously high levels of GHB, Rufenal, and Ketamine consistent with overdose.

Nick's fingers felt cold.

The trifecta of sedatives were the same drugs that he and Courtney had used on Maya and Alison the night he'd run Emily off the road. The irony of that night was that Courtney had drugged Maya and had stayed behind while he drove back to Rosewood. Running into Emily on her bike had been a coincidence.

Finding Alison at the bar had not been a coincidence. He had to stall…to wait on Courtney. When she had showed up she'd been virtually unrecognizable in her disguise, her normally blue eyes shaded by brown contacts. She had put her acting skills to use.

That's what she was…an actress.

Did he even know the real Courtney?

Nick let out a gust of air, sitting back in his seat in shock. He'd been blind to it. Willfully blind. Willfully ignoring the monster that was right there in his face.

In hindsight he had seen it coming. They'd been drifting apart ever since Emily left Texas. He assumed it was normal growing pains. They'd been so far apart. Things were bound to be different.

It had started out so simple. They had a plan for him to move to New York so he could be close to Emily. And Wilden had agreed to help them out from Rosewood.

Nick had taken a drive down to the small little Pennsylvania town and watched Emily's family move in. It had been reconnaissance. He'd lurked around outside her house that night, taking pictures and sending them to Courtney on a burner phone he had gotten for her.

Courtney had sent the first text to Emily that night.

The messages had started out simple enough, and Nick was all too eager to please her. He'd been conditioned to please her. She was calling all the shots.

It wasn't easy getting to Emily. She had a good support group in her friends, which made planning things a little bit harder. Courtney insisted that he get to know everyone Emily was spending time with. She wanted to know every detail.

He'd followed them around school. He'd stalked them outside of school. He got to know her habits. He was Courtney's eyes and ears.

But halfway through Emily's pregnancy Courtney's attitude changed. They wanted different things. Courtney wanted to play with Emily. Nick wanted to make her pay.

Things had escalated after Darren was arrested in New York. Courtney told him that Alison and Emily found the hard drive and turned it over.

He should have known she was lying. He knew it was impossible for Alison and Emily to get that quick of a turn-around to the cops after they'd been attacked.

They had started arguing more. He was getting a ton of pushback about odd things. She'd wanted to hurt Emily like Emily had hurt them, but every time he put Emily in danger Courtney would get angry at him.

She'd chewed him out for running her off the road, but then turned around and locked her in a steam room.

The more immersed Courtney got in Emily's pregnancy, the thicker the wedge was driven between them. It had come to a head one day several weeks back. She had blown up at him and then cut him off.

He hadn't lied to Emily when he told her they'd had a falling out. He'd come to the hospital alone. He hadn't seen Courtney in two weeks, not since their fight over their plans to finally get their revenge on her.

Courtney's erratic behavior hadn't seemed out of place. He'd just assumed that seeing Emily get so close to giving birth had triggered her. He assumed she was grieving. He assumed they were sharing the same pain.

But she had been using him the whole time.

Nick ripped opened the glove compartment. He pulled his gun out, checking to make sure it was fully loaded before shoving it into the stolen doctor's coat that he was wearing. He'd had the same idea as Courtney. Wearing scrubs in a hospital was as good as dressing up as a chameleon in the wild.

He stared at the building. The hospital was the city of Troy, and he was just another doctor in a lab coat, a Trojan horse that would be invited in…greeted with exuberance and smiles.

Yet underneath it all was a deadly attack waiting to happen.

o ~ O ~ o

Emily's phone was sitting on the stand by her bed. She'd sent three texts to Alison since she'd left, all increasing in concern.

Don't make me send Hanna after you.

Then,

Everything okay?

Finally followed by,

I'm worried. Call me.

It had been thirty minutes since Alison left. The blonde hadn't told her where exactly she was going, only that she was going to get food. She'd taken her time on outings before, but something about this trip felt different. Emily felt a strange tingling feeling in her spine, an inkling that something was wrong.

She was sidetracked when she felt Autumn bite down, clamping hard as she nursed.

Emily sucked in a breath and cringed, flinching. She was still getting used to how much power was in her daughter's jaw.

She tried not to jerk in response. She had learned that distractions during nursing could lead to problems down the line. She'd only fed her a handful of times since her birth, but they were both picking up the routine quickly.

She loved watching her. Sometimes Autumn's curious little eyes would find her mom's and she would relax into her embrace. She knew her mommy and she felt safe with her.

Emily had been surprised that Autumn had taken to breastfeeding so naturally. She'd been warned beforehand that some babies had trouble. She'd been told that sometimes newborns had problems latching, but Autumn had picked it up easily. She was a very smart little girl.

She was also a very strong little girl. Emily hadn't been prepared for how sore she'd be or how strange it would be at first. But all she had to do was look at her baby girl and it all went away.

She cleared her throat and reached for the mug of fresh water that her nurse had brought to her. She sipped it through the cold metal straw.

It tasted strange, like bad tap water…like it had been treated with something.

She put the mug down and peered at her baby. Her eyes were open, calmly looking around as she ate.

Emily couldn't get over the beautiful tinge of the marble grey coloring of her eyes.

Alison said the color reminded her of a beautiful cloudy day at the beach when the skies weren't quite blue, but painted the ocean with a shade of steely grey that bounced off of the water making it appear bluish grey.

Autumn's anomalistic eye coloring varied by color depending on the kind of light she was in. In natural light they almost had a tinge of purple, flecks of violet, which was perfect for her namesake. It's like Alison and Emily had conjured the color up with all of their arguing about shades of the rainbow. It was as if Autumn had heard them and decided she could be all colors of the rainbow.

Alison loved watching Autumn's every moment. She was smitten with her, and with motherhood.

"Sometimes I think my mother passed me off to a nanny or an assistant the second I was born. She was probably super cold and detached. I doubt my dad was even there. I don't want Autumn to go one second of her life without knowing we love her," Alison had said just that morning as she'd held the baby close, watching the sunrise with her.

Emily had been standing next to her, watching her in awe. The blonde looked magnificent in the reflection of the purple morning sky. She looked even sexier with the newborn in her arms.

"She's so special. She's going to do amazing things." Alison had kissed Autumn's head. "Isn't that right...our little violet-eyed visionary?"

Emily was obsessed with the way that her daughter's eyes seemed to absorb whatever hues were around her.

She was fascinated by everything about her baby girl. She'd been consumed by her daughter since she first laid eyes on her.

The longer Autumn spent nursing the harder it was for her to keep her eyes open. Her eyelids started to droop closed as she slowly ate herself into a milk coma.

It was regular moments that Emily enjoyed with her. The quiet moments were few and far and in between, but every time she was with her she felt overjoyed.

She liked the moments even more when Alison was around to share them with her.

She wanted to reach for her phone to call her, but her hands were full. She didn't want to disturb Autumn.

She was overreacting about Alison not being there. She knew she was overreacting.

She looked down at her daughter.

"These last few months have made your mommy a neurotic mess." She cooed quietly.

The emotions and the mood swings had been horrendous. She couldn't wait to get back to a normal state of mind. She couldn't wait to start swimming and kickboxing and riding again. She knew it was going to be different now that she was a mom, but she also knew she needed to find her way back to things that made her feel mentally balanced. She had spent months worrying about when the other shoe was going to drop.

If she had only known that the other shoe was right outside her room…and it was waiting to crush her.

Courtney had casually walked by Emily's room numerous times after stealing a badge from a young nurse. She had been walking around in scrubs. She wore a face mask so no one would question who she was. She carried hospital supplies to look busy.

She'd walked by earlier and saw Hanna sitting with her. Alison was nowhere in sight. She knew she had a very small window of opportunity, so she kept a close eye on the room, waiting for Hanna to leave. Once she saw her go she sauntered back towards the room.

Through the crack in the door she could see that Emily was nursing the baby. The brunette was softly rubbing her head, then moving her fingers to touch her impossibly small hand. She whispered words of love to the infant. The nurses had told her to talk to her to encourage her when she was eating.

"You're such a good little eater," Emily said quietly, trying not to break the baby's focus.

She stroked her daughter's cheek, helping to stimulate her. She watched as her tiny puckered mouth suckled. Like a kitten, Autumn pushed her fingers into her mother's flesh, kneading gently.

Courtney's eyes welled up with tears.

The way they were connecting was beautiful. But it was also painful.

It should have been her.

Emily leaned back, exhausted. It had been a really long labor, and the complications had taken a lot out of her.

She was tired. She thought it was just post postpartum exhaustion. But she was tired for an entirely different reason.

Courtney was waiting for the sedatives she'd slipped into her drink to take effect. She'd seen the young nurse getting Emily some water and had taken the opportunity to drug the drink. She'd been careful not to use too much. She didn't want to hurt the baby.

She'd been waiting on the perfect opportunity to make her move. Someone had been with Emily almost every hour of the day. It was nearly impossible to get near her, which made it impossible to get near the child.

Emily had remained very vigilant, never letting her daughter out of her sight. She was the mama bear Courtney always knew she'd be.

Emily felt Autumn bite down again and she grimaced.

"Easy, Autumn." She huffed.

Autumn. Courtney had been intrigued by the name when she first heard it. It was pretty. She was pretty…just like her mom.

Autumn Violet had a ring to it. Courtney liked it, but she knew she was going to have to change it once they were on the run.

Initially, Nick was supposed to be with her and the baby, but he'd gone completely mental after Wilden died.

She didn't know what the big deal was. It's not like they were real brothers who had grown up together. Though, she wasn't sure she'd understand the connection even if that had been the case. She felt nothing for her own brother.

Killing Wilden had been no different than killing Isaac's frog…or Emily's ladybug. He was just another animal.

After she shot him in New York she'd turned him in, her plan already set in motion. She had visited him, falling all over herself for "the accident". She told him she'd make it up to him. She promised she had a way to get him out.

They would fake his death. He would write the note, and she would help him get away after he took the drugs. She could make all the bad things disappear.

He didn't know she thought he was a bad thing.

She'd promised she would come back.

She'd kept that promise, but not for the reasons she told him.

She'd made a noose out of his bed sheet during the guard's shift change. She'd tied it around his bedpost and put it around his neck before pushing him off the top bunk. He grunted under his breath. He'd gasped for air for about a minute, then stopped struggling. She'd watched him take his last breath.

Nick had been inconsolable after getting the news, but Courtney was too far gone to care. They'd drifted apart. She was done with him.

He was still lurking around town somewhere, but Courtney had been so enamored with the baby that she'd lost track of him. She wouldn't have to worry about him much longer. She wouldn't have to worry about anyone much longer.

Emily yawned. She was getting drowsy. She fought her exhaustion. Her eyes blurred as she watched Autumn's lips slowing down. She was starting to fall asleep, too.

"My sweet sleepy girl," Emily smiled at her.

God, she was precious. Perfect. And hers. She had nurtured her for nearly ten months. She had fallen in love with her before meeting her. The piece of her heart that she had given to her daughter was a huge portion of her soul that she was happy to extend to her.

"I love you," Emily whispered. "I love you so much."

She felt the infant's fingers twitching, her soft fingernails tickling her.

Emily felt warm and fuzzy. The room around her was filled with all sorts of strange colors. The wallpaper looked like it was peeling off of the walls.

Emily blinked several times, remembering that there was no wallpaper. The paint was running. She felt like she was falling, no net to catch her. The last thought she had before she slipped into unconsciousness was about Alison. She still hadn't heard back from her.

"Alison," she mumbled under her breath.

She closed her eyes and sank into the bed, her arms still wrapped protectively around her daughter.

Autumn nuzzled closer to her chest, sucked harder, her little mouth working overtime.

Courtney waited, watched for a moment. The only motion she saw was Autumn wriggling around in her blanket. She was in a dreamlike state. Little crackling noises were coming out of her nose as she nursed with her eyes closed.

Courtney inched forward, pushing the door open. She looked around the room. It wasn't the first time she'd been in Emily's hospital room.

The first time she'd been in a different area of the hospital. Courtney remembered the way the gash in Emily's head had upset her. She'd only been trying to get her to listen. That's why she'd had Nick and the twins rig the set up at the Halloween dance.

She had been angry at Emily. She had wanted to teach her a lesson. So she'd dug the scalpel blade into her stomach, threatening to destroy everything Emily took for granted.

"Do it and I'll cut her out of you right now."

She had pushed the blade into her skin just enough to scare her.

She had seen the look of horror on Emily's face when she turned the contraction simulator on. She thought she was losing the baby. Emily had passed out after seeing the fake blood.

The second time she'd been in Emily's hospital room she almost had actually lost the baby.

When Courtney found her on prom night she was soaked in a puddle of her own blood. She had gone to Emily's apartment in search of the necklace with the tracker. She didn't want Nick to be able to track her anymore.

She'd found Emily passed out in her bathroom instead. The red sticky stuff oozing out of the brunette had catapulted Courtney right back to the locker room, to the instant she lost her baby. She had furiously tried to clean Emily up, to make the blood go away.

Emily begged for help. Courtney had kissed her, trying to get rid of her tears. She wanted to make it stop. She wanted the pain to stop.

She remembered the heated flesh of Emily's skin. She felt like she was going to explode into flames. She'd tried to cool her down with a wet cloth as Emily writhed in pain. She promised to take care of her, to take care of the baby.

She had tried to look between Emily's legs…tried to see if she could see anything, but all she'd been able to see was blood.

"A mother without a child. A soul without its heart...a little heart that leaves broken pieces behind. It doesn't seem right." She'd choked back tears. "No mother should suffer the depth of pain of outliving her baby. It shouldn't happen. But it does."

It had happened to her.

She promised Emily that she would stay with her. And she did. Even when Alison showed up at the hospital looking like a dime-store whore in her way-too-short prom dress.

She'd had to drug Alison that night just to get close to Emily…to make sure the baby was okay.

She remembered the smell of the room. The colors. The energy. The energy was really loud.

She remembered the way Emily had stared at her when she woke up.

"I've been here before," Not only had she been in Emily's hospital room, but she had been in one of her own after she lost her baby. "But it was different."

She had touched Emily to make sure she was clean. The blood in Emily's bathroom had been just like the blood in the locker room.

The blood was gone.

The baby was okay.

The baby was now in her mother's arms. The words that Courtney had said to Emily that day were finally true.

"You're safe now. I took care of everything. We can finally be a family."

She had been so certain she could make Emily love her like she loved Alison. The blonde looked a lot like her. Courtney was sure she could become Alison DiLaurentis.

She had been watching Alison, memorizing her mannerisms. She had been practicing. She had a closet full of identical clothes. She knew they could be a family.

My family.

Courtney took a step towards her bed, trying her very best to be quiet. She was afraid Emily would wake up. She hadn't given her a very strong dose of drugs. She didn't want it to contaminate the breastmilk.

She watched Emily sleep, wondering what she was dreaming about. She saw her jaw slowly go slack as she tilted her head from side to side.

Courtney wanted to see into her mind, though she wouldn't have liked what she found there.

The brunette was dreaming about Alison. They were in New York. Alison was kissing her, nipping at her neck. Emily could feel her fingers slipping underneath the covers between them, touching her chest and pressing kisses against her bosom.

Autumn's vigorous suckling was sending her unconscious brain strange mixed signals. It wasn't the first time her dreams had been sexual since giving birth. She had woken up that morning panting and aching for Alison, who had been all too eager to crawl in to bed with her.

Emily didn't mind the vivid dreams. She knew it would be a little while before she and Alison got to do much of anything in the bedroom.

She read that post-pregnancy sex dreams were normal, that her hormones were raging out of control and her body was trying to find a balance. And when Autumn nursed it stimulated chemicals in her body.

As Autumn sucked Emily fell into a strange hallucination. The drugs were turning her dream into something frightening.

Alison was concentrating on her chest while their bodies moved together. Emily could barely catch her breath. Alison's body fell on top of hers, her full weight pressing against her.

Emily moaned in her sleep.

When Courtney heard the noise she timidly took a step back.

I'm sorry. She felt something bubbling in her stomach. An emotion of some kind. Fear? Shame? Concern?

Emily started whimpering as her dream spiraled. Alison had her face buried in Emily's chest, but something was wrong.

She couldn't breathe.

The height of the moment was saddled with a heavy weight of terror. Alison lifted her head, snapping her neck back so viciously that Emily could hear it crack. Alison's eyes turned from blue to black.

Alison whipped her hands up towards her throat, motioning that she was choking. Her eyes widened in fear. She opened her mouth and water started pouring out of it. She tried to scream, but she couldn't.

The bed below them disappeared. Emily landed on her back against a hard surface. The frozen ground beneath her body gave way to a puddle of water. She shot up and saw the rising tide swallowing Alison.

Alison was frantically waving her hands in the air, screaming for help.

She was fighting for her life.

It was real.

At that very moment Alison was struggling to survive, though Emily didn't know it yet.

There was something connecting them. Something deeper than either one of them understood. Emily saw Alison reaching out for her hand, desperately trying to keep her head above water.

A wave crashed over her, sending her under the unforgiving current.

Emily remembered what it felt like being trapped under the water…held down by Courtney. The agony of not being able to catch her breath.

"Alison!" Emily cried in her sleep before burrowing the back of her head deeper into her pillow.

Courtney snarled harshly when she heard the blonde's name. She stared at the child on her mother's breast. She wanted to grab her, snatch her, run away. She wanted what was hers.

She tiptoed next to Emily's bed.

Emily seemed to be settling, though her mind was filled with visions of Alison being dragged under the water…of being unable to breathe.

Courtney looked down at Autumn, seeing her up close for the first time. Her facial features were soft, like Emily's. If she squinted she could see traces of her brother. It was strange how she was such a perfect blend of them. Babies were weird. If you looked long enough you could see them morph from one parent to the other.

Her eyes were bright.

So bright.

They reminded her of her grandfather.

She gingerly reached out and touched Autumn's cheek, which startled her awake. It was a strange touch to the newborn. Unfamiliar. Her eyes shot open, her mouth still clamped on Emily's breast. She curled her fingers into her mother's skin.

Emily drew her closer to her body in her unconsciousness. Autumn was staring at Courtney, her brow tight and tense.

"Shh," Courtney said quietly. "Shh, I'm not going to hurt you, little one."

Emily's eyes were moving rapidly beneath her eyelids. Courtney could see them fluttering. She bent over and kissed her forehead, trying to soothe her. It only made the brunette whine more.

Courtney moved her hand between Autumn and Emily, pushing two of her fingers into Autumn's mouth. She pried her jaw away from Emily's nipple.

Autumn look confused, her little brows turned down in a scowl. Courtney carefully picked her up, leaving Emily's breast fully exposed.

She'd seen her naked before. She'd watched her when she changed, when she showered, when she was with Isaac…with Alison. But this was a different kind of exposure. Her fully engorged bosom was soft and supple.

The swollen flesh was hot to the touch. And hard. It looked painful. She wanted to ask Emily if it was painful. She wanted to make the pain go away.

Emily twitched, her head tilting as she wept in her sleep. Something was happening to her in her dreams. Something bad.

Courtney stared at Emily, unconscious, unknowing.

She was reminded of the first time she'd drugged her.

She had looked so soft that night. So vulnerable.

Courtney remembered thinking about those boys, and what would have happened if they'd touched her.

Emily had been so out of it when she found her stretched out on the floor, pants sliding down her hips. She could have done whatever she wanted to her. It would have been so easy. She could have fucked her and made Maya watch.

Maybe things would have been different if she'd done it. She could have made Emily realize she loved her. She could have made her feel so good.

She remembered the urges she'd felt at seeing her pants undone…how much she wanted to feel her and watch her writhe in pleasure.

She'd wanted to. She'd wanted to so bad.

But she'd been a good girl that night.

She had been a good girl.

I'm good. She told herself.

She had protected Emily. And now she was protecting Autumn.

She stared at Emily's exposed flesh, thinking about the nature of how a breast was both sexual and not sexual. Breasts weren't only for pleasure, but for nourishment. Her breast looked so natural. Pure.

She reached out to touch it, stroke it, but not in a sexual way. It was not the way she'd felt that night at the party.

She was fascinated with the milk dribbling out. She was fascinated that Emily's body could do such amazing things. She just wanted to feel the connection that Emily shared with her daughter.

She had the urge to kiss it, and to taste what Autumn was tasting.

Emily moaned, a mixture between something that sounded like helplessness and desperation.

Courtney felt her body starting to react to Emily's heated flesh, so she pulled away.

She would be good. She wouldn't hurt Emily.

She adjusted Emily's clothing, covering her, making sure that her most vulnerable areas were no longer exposed.

"My angel," she uttered under her breath.

She lifted Autumn up and closed her eyes as she inhaled a deep breath through her nose. She smelled like Emily. So good. So clean.

Autumn's lip quivered and she started fussing.

Courtney shushed her and pulled her mask up over her mouth. She heard Emily stir in her bed.

When Emily heard her daughter crying she could feel the tether pulling her out of her nightmare and back into reality.

"Autumn?" Emily mumbled, eyes still closed. "I'm here, baby."

She blinked, her vision in a haze. Her eyes drifted closed again.

Courtney took a step back into the shadows, willing herself not to run. She couldn't appear suspicious. Emily was drowsy, but she knew the brunette would spring to life if she thought her daughter was in danger.

Emily knew something was wrong. She could feel it, but she couldn't make sense of it. Her mouth felt sticky and dry.

"My…my baby." She jerked uncomfortably in bed. "Where is my baby?"

"She's fine, honey," Courtney said, disguising her voice, trying to sound like the young nurse who had been caring for her. "We just need to take her for a few vitals."

"She needs to finish nursing." Emily mumbled. "She's not done. I know when she's done…"

She tried to open her eyes, but her eyelids were heavy. They were like weights dragging her down.

Emily was lost in the dark as she searched for Alison. She couldn't see anything. But in the silent air she heard a tiny little voice. Soft little fingers touched her cheek.

Autumn wasn't old enough to reach out for her yet. She wasn't old enough to form words. But Emily knew her voice, clear as day, like a premonition of her future.

"Mommy, you have to wake up. Please, mommy. Please wake up."

o ~ O ~ o

Hanna and Mona had just finished eating in the cafeteria. Caleb was sitting with them. He'd brought some pastries from the café and coffee and tea for Alison and Emily. Hanna was starting to get impatient. She was still waiting to hear from Emily, waiting on the all clear so they didn't accidentally walk in on her with her tits on full display.

"She still hasn't answered her texts." Hanna frowned at her screen. "Her kid must have deflated her entire boob by now."

Mona laughed.

"I'm sure she's just enjoying her time with her new baby."

"Alison is probably jealous of all the attention the child is getting with her girlfriend's lady parts." Hanna tapped on the screen, like maybe that would refresh her text inbox.

"And that would be my cue to leave." Caleb put his palms against the table and slowly pushed himself to his feet. He gave Hanna a peck on the forehead.

"You're a dude. Boobs shouldn't make you want to run away." Hanna teased him.

Caleb laughed and rolled his eyes.

"I only have eyes for your boobs." Caleb rubbed her shoulder.

"You have him trained well." Mona nodded in approval.

"I've got to get back to the café. Can't leave Mike there unattended for too long. He might turn the place into a frat house, complete with waterslide."

"Sabrina would kill him," Mona said.

"You really think that would stop him?" Caleb lifted his brow, casting a skeptical glance her way.

After a beat Mona nodded,

"Yeah, you should definitely get back."

The girls stood up so they could walk Caleb out.

"Emily's tea is in the one with the green sleeve on it. It has some kind of herbs in it that helps with the um…" He lifted his hands and cupped the air near his chest, miming a pair of breasts, "…milk production and stuff."

"It's cute that you know that." Hanna smiled, pressing a kiss against his lips.

"The research was all Mike. He was very insistent about it." Caleb grabbed his phone from the table, popping it in his pocket.

"He spent all day looking at boobs online, didn't he?" Mona furrowed her brow, her eyes narrowing.

"While the cat is away…the mouse will play." Caleb grinned.

"I'm going to wring his little mousey neck." Mona shook her head.

"That's child's play. You should go nuclear. Share the potty training photo." Hanna wiggled her brows with a smile.

"You are absolutely terrifying." Caleb wrapped his arm around his girlfriend and pulled her in for a hug as they walked towards the hallway.

"With my luck if I shared that photo it would only make him more popular. He was a cute little devil." Mona smiled, reaching for the coffee and the tea. She followed Hanna and Caleb.

"He was okay." Hanna waved her off, reaching for her phone. "He's nothing like Emily's perfect little doll baby though. If I were her I'd never let her go. Look." She pulled up a picture she'd taken of Autumn. "Look how cute she is."

"Aw." Mona smiled. "I feel like she gets cuter every hour. Seriously. Most newborns look like old men's wrinkled foreskin, but not her."

"Why would you put that mental image in my head?" Hanna gawked. "And why do you know what dirty old bastard penises look like?"

"Why are we talking about body parts?" Caleb grimaced.

"I did a medical study on testicular cancer for part of my college admissions essay." Mona shrugged. She looked at Hanna's phone, swiping through the pictures. "Everyone is always talking about how cute babies are, but most of them are ugly when they're born. I can't believe Emily's kid came out looking like a damn Gerber baby. She is one of the prettiest babies I have ever seen."

"I know, right?" Hanna smiled. "Wait until you see her in person. She makes the most adorable little faces." She pushed her lips out into a pout. "I want one." She peered up at Caleb.

He shook his head vigorously. He knew she was just saying it to say it, but he wanted to be perfectly clear.

"Not any time soon," he said, stopping at the stairwell door. "We have plenty of time."

"I know." Hanna sighed. She had so much she wanted to do before she settled down and had a family, but when she saw Emily's baby her uterus wanted nothing more than to start popping babies out. "Emily said the same thing. And she promised to let me borrow hers."

"Jeeze, Han, you'd think you were talking about a pair of shoes." Mona chuckled.

"I would trade every pair of shoes I own to have a kid as gorgeous as little miss Autumn Violet Fields."

"I'll give you a call later." Caleb pressed his lips against the top of her head one last time.

Mona rolled her eyes. Their love was sickeningly sweet.

"Love you." Hanna leaned forward, wrapping her arms around him and sucking in a breath, taking in his musk.

Caleb parted ways with the girls. They started up the stairs while he walked towards the outdoor walkway.

Hanna pulled up her texts and grumbled.

"Still nothing?" Mona asked.

"No. Let me try Alison."

She typed a cheeky message,

Has Emily finished feeding Autumn yet? Feels like she's been eating forever. Are her boobs not out of milk by now? What's the sitch? You two getting freaky or something? She go from letting the babe suck on her to letting you do the honors?

As soon as she hit send they heard a chirping noise echoing from below them. They exchanged glances and then bounded back towards the first floor. They looked around, but didn't see anything.

Hanna hit the 'call' button. The Material Girl ringtone Alison had set for Hanna jingled loudly. Hanna and Mona followed the sound to the phone.

The screen was cracked, lit up and showing a screensaver of Emily and Autumn.

"That's weird." Mona leaned down to pick up the phone.

Hanna had a terrible feeling in the pit of her stomach.

"This is not good…" Her eyes widened as she snatched the phone from Mona.

There was no way in hell Alison would go two seconds without her phone, not with Emily and Autumn so vulnerable…not when they had someone out there torturing them. She saw several unread texts from Emily.

"It's no big deal," Mona said. "She probably just dropped it or something…"

But Hanna knew things that Mona didn't. She knew better. She knew what Alison and Emily had been dealing with behind the scenes.

Mona saw the look on Hanna's face.

"Hanna, what's wrong?"

"I think Alison might be in trouble. We have to find her."

She hit her home screen and then pressed the image of Caleb. He answered with a laugh after two rings.

"Couldn't go two minutes without me, could you?" He asked.

Hanna didn't laugh.

"I need you to come back. Something happened to Alison…"

Three minutes later he was meeting them outside the stairwell door. Hanna handed Caleb her phone, like maybe it held some magical answers.

"This isn't going to do me much good." Caleb looked around. "I need something solid to work with." His eyes landed on a camera near the stairwell. "Give me a few minutes. I saw the security room on my way in."

"Is anyone going to tell me what's going on?" Mona frowned. She was starting to get worried.

"Someone is after Emily and Alison, and maybe Autumn." Hanna bit her lip.

"Since when?"

"It's a long story." She grabbed Mona's arm. "Come on, I'll explain everything while we look." She glanced at Caleb. "Hurry."

"We'll find her." He nodded, rushing off.

Alison's survival depended on two girls she'd once tortured and a boy who had once despised her so much he'd considered lacing her coffee with something that would give her raging diarrhea. Yet now they were in a race against time to find her and save her life.

Hanna checked the parking lot, narrowly missing running into the boy in the doctor's coat with the gun. Mona scoured the bathrooms, closets, and other stairwells.

Caleb hacked his way into the security area. He scanned the cameras until he found the one he was looking for. He worked his way backwards, trying to see if anything out of the ordinary had happened. A few people strolled through the hallway. Hanna and Mona were seen on tape walking towards the cafeteria. A well-dressed woman walked into the stairwell. A delivery person rolled a cart towards the food storage area.

He stopped the camera when he saw the door leading to the stairwell crack, but then close. A shadow fell over the crack at the bottom of the door. He watched carefully. He observed the timestamp and then looked at cameras in close proximity.

After three minutes he found something.

A gurney being wheeled around a corner with a large human-sized lump underneath a sheet. The person moving the gurney was out of the frame. It looked suspiciously like they knew where the cameras were. It was enough to hide their face, but not to hide the direction of where they were going.

He quickly dialed Hanna's number. She picked up immediately.

"Check the morgue," he said.

"Oh, God." Hanna felt rancid bile rising in her throat. "Did someone kill her? Oh…God. She's dead?"

Hanna couldn't believe she was getting upset over Alison's life. She'd once jokingly told the blonde that she wouldn't shed tears if she died.

Her tears were pretty fucking real now.

"No. No, I think I saw hand movement. She's probably locked up…"

Before Caleb could finish Hanna hung up and sprinted down the hallway towards the place where all the dead bodies were kept. She said a silent prayer that Alison wasn't the newest member of the dead Boys and Girls Club.

She pushed through a door, grumbling about how easy it was to access. The hospital needed better security protocols. She was going to have to remember to ask Spencer if her mom could sue them for negligence.

"Alison?" Hanna burst into the room.

It was cold. She hadn't expected it to be so cold. She assumed the mortuary cabinets would be refrigerated, but the room felt like something out of an Alaskan winter. She wrapped her sweater tightly around herself.

"Ali? Are you in here?"

Inside the cold locker there was the faintest twitch.

I'm still here. I'm not dead. I'm not dead yet.

Alison opened her mouth to talk, but it was so dry that it was cracked and painful. Her lips and tongue felt like useless lumps.

The worst part was that she was semi-conscious. She knew what was happening. She managed to croak out another call for help.

A powerful chill rocked her body, one so painful she wished she could just curl in on herself and die.

The icy waters had won. They were claiming her. She was sinking…sinking…sinking.

But then she heard a faint voice, similar to how Emily had heard the pleas in her room.

"You and mommy have to wake up."

She felt little hands shaking her, begging her.

The connection was strong. Alison could feel Emily with her. She swayed in the murky waters, grasping at a tiny shred of light where she could see Emily's hand. She searched for a way out from underneath the ice.

Emily was there to pull her out.

"I've got you, Ali." She pulled her in close to her chest. "You're safe."

"Emily." She cried. She felt safe in her arms. Warm.

If she was going to die at least it was going to be in her girlfriend's arms.

She heard a banging noise, a voice shouting.

Her eyes shot open.

"Ali! Ali, talk to me! Where are you?"

"Em…Emily?" Alison gasped for air, her voice coming out froggy and weak.

She felt the walls shaking and for a few seconds she thought she was the one shaking them, but then she heard something slam shut. Someone was searching the cold lockers. Someone was looking for her.

"Here! I'm in here!" She banged against the door.

"Alison?" Hanna heard her faint cries. "Keep making noise! I hear you! I'm here and I hear you!"

"Get me out!" Alison sobbed, pounding wildly against the door. "Get me out of here!"

She kicked. She screamed. She channeled all of her energy, every bit she had left.

"Jesus Christ." Hanna huffed as she grabbed the handle, yanking the door open, totally stunned by the fact that someone had locked Alison in a frozen tomb to die.

All the threats they'd been getting went far beyond what Hanna realized.

She grabbed the edge of the metal table and pulled it forward. The first thing she saw was a matted mess of blonde hair caked in blood.

Alison was looking up at her. Her lips were blue.

"Holy shit. Ali…"

The light burned Alison's eyes, but it was the most beautiful light she'd ever seen. She rolled off of the table and fell into Hanna's arms, partly to keep herself on her feet, partly to get close to Hanna's body heat, and partly from relief.

"H-Hanna." She shivered.

"What the hell happened? How long have you been in here?" Hanna ripped her cashmere sweater off and wrapped it around the shivering blonde. "What happened to you?"

"I d-don't…" Alison's lips felt numb. "Someone h-hit me. I woke…I woke up in here." She rubbed her arms. She was already starting to feel her circulation returning. "H-how did you find me?"

"Caleb. He saw someone bring you in here. We found your phone." She held Alison's phone up.

Alison looked at the newly cracked screen, staring at her girlfriend and her daughter.

"I…I have to get to Emily. She's in danger. Autumn is in danger."

"I tried texting her. She's not answering. I even tried her mom and dad, but they're out having dinner." Hanna swallowed hard. "Caleb and Mona are…"

Alison didn't let Hanna finish her statement. She practically tripped over her feet as she surged towards the door. Her legs were numb, but that didn't stop her.

"Hey," Hanna rushed after her. "Slow down. Just…take it easy. I just pulled your ass out of a meat locker."

Alison brushed her off and continued rushing towards the door. She nearly ran over Mona as she shoved it open.

The tiny brunette let out a startled cry and stumbled backwards. Alison barely acknowledged her. She was focused on getting to Emily.

Hanna grabbed Mona's arm.

"Emily is in trouble." It was all Hanna had to say to get her friend moving.

Hanna explained that she'd pulled Alison out of a mortuary cabinet.

For someone who probably had hypothermia she was quick on her feet.

Alison ran by the elevators, remembering how she'd been manipulated to get off of the elevator before being attacked. Someone had access to the electronics, and she didn't trust that the person who had locked her in the morgue wouldn't stall the elevator and then cut the cord and send her careening to her death.

She ran towards the stairs, her body still aching from the cold. Her blood was pumping, something Hanna was keenly aware of.

"Slow the fuck down." Hanna caught up to her before she got to the stairwell door.

"If you overheat your body too fast after being in that freezer you could have a heart attack." Mona tried to explain.

But Alison didn't care. She had to warn Emily. She had to get to the baby.

She didn't know it was too late.

Courtney was descending the stairs with Autumn in her arms. The elevators had too many cameras watching them. She had to be careful if she wanted to get out without a trace.

As she got closer to the first floor she heard voices. Emily's friends. She'd been listening to them for months, spying on them on the off-chance that they knew about what was going on.

She paused, dancing around on her feet. She'd come so far. She'd waited for months. She didn't want to lose her chance. She didn't want to use the handgun in her pocket, but she would if she had to.

When she got to the bottom of the stairwell she quickly slipped around a corner underneath the steps. The same place that Nick had been hiding when he attacked Alison.

Autumn started to whine, but Courtney covered her mouth to shush her. The baby kicked her little legs in protest. She couldn't breathe. She was suffocating.

"Shhh." Courtney pressed her palm down harder against her nose and mouth. "Stop crying."

The girls were almost there, talking loudly.

"You didn't see who hit you?" Mona asked.

Courtney's head snapped up. If someone had attacked Alison that meant she wasn't alone at the hospital.

What was Nick up to? What was his end game?

"No." Alison answered. "I didn't see anything. Whoever it was clocked me from behind."

"I'll let the front desk know. I'll keep an eye on the lobby," Mona stopped in her tracks. "We need to make sure whoever did this can't slip out the front door."

"Good idea." Alison nodded.

There was a clacking noise as Mona's heels hit the ground as she rushed away.

"You have a pretty good idea of who did this, don't you?" Hanna asked.

"That bitch is here. I just know it."

Courtney's anger almost got the better of her. She almost pulled the gun out.

"I can call Caleb. He's got eyes on security. She won't get away." Hanna opened the door. "We're going to get her."

Courtney tried to hide herself in the shadows, her hand still obstructing Autumn's cries.

"If she hurts Emily and Autumn I will destroy her. I'll kill her. Slowly…so she feels every fucking second of it."

Courtney could tell by her tone of voice that it wasn't hyperbole. She really would come after her.

She felt a buzz of excitement as she listened to Alison's determined footsteps stomping up the stairs. She was torn by Alison's ferocity and tenacity. The fact that she was willing to kill to protect Emily really resonated with her.

Alison had even seemed to develop a protective nature over the baby.

The baby.

Courtney felt her body stiffen as she snapped her head down, realizing that Autumn was completely still in her arms.

When she realized what she was doing she pulled her hand away. She didn't see any movement for several seconds, but then Autumn's chest fluctuated rapidly. The infant drew in a sharp breath and she blinked, dazed, but unharmed.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." She stroked Autumn's head. "I would never hurt you, sweet girl."

Autumn's insightful little eyes were brimming with tears. Her lips puckered and quivered. But she didn't cry. It was almost as if she was afraid to cry.

"Don't be scared." Courtney cooed. "I'll protect you. I'll always protect you."

She sat in the stairwell with Autumn for a few minutes, trying to figure out what to do. She had to think of a way to get out. She knew she couldn't sneak out the front, not with nurses on alert that someone was attacking people in stairwells.

Fucking Nick.

He'd ruined everything.

She knew her window of opportunity was closing, fast. Soon Autumn would be declared missing and in danger, even though she was with her real rightful mother. People would try to rip the baby away from her…just like Emily had ripped her heart out that day in the locker room.

Her phone vibrated from inside her pocket.

Where r u?

She frowned at the screen. Nick had become such a goddamn burden. They wanted different things. The game had started out simple, but he'd made it complicated.

She didn't need him anymore. He'd been unbearable since Darren's death. He'd whined "my brother" this and "my brother" that. What Nick didn't understand was that Darren was a liability. She'd been able to sense that when she met up with him on Valentine's Day when he'd been snooping outside of Emily's house after she'd switched out Wayne Fields' medication. Darren had barked about going after Emily then. She'd warned him not to.

He'd gone rogue. A mad dog that she had to put down. He went after Emily in New York despite her orders not to. He'd messed up the plan.

She didn't like it when people messed with her plans, especially when those plans involved Emily.

People were always trying to take what belonged to her.

But now she had everything she desired. She had all the family she needed.

She looked down at the newborn in her arms. It was strange to see such a perfect blend of Isaac and Emily in her. She had the softness of Isaac's eyes, but the fierceness of Emily's gaze.

My blood. She thought. Mine.

She rubbed her fingers against the baby's cheek. Autumn started squirming. She opened her mouth and rooted around, like she was looking for something.

"Such a pretty baby." She played with Autumn's fingers.

She could see so much of Emily in her. It was a beautiful thing. She would carry Emily with her forever. What she couldn't get from Emily she could get from Autumn.

I can make her love me.

She could do whatever she wanted to to her, because she was a baby, and she didn't know anything about life yet.

"I'm going to teach you so many things." Courtney smiled stiffly. "So many things." She traced her finger against Autumn's jaw.

Autumn whimpered, sniffling.

o ~ O ~ o

Emily writhed uncomfortably in her bed, her body covered in sweat. She was reacting poorly to the drugs in her system.

Alison was drowning. It was dark. She heard the cries of a child somewhere in the distance.

Not just a child.

Her child.

"Mommy, you have to wake up. Please, mommy." The little angelic voice was pleading, hands gripping her arms, her fingers pressing into her skin.

But Emily was sure it was Autumn. She knew it was her daughter.

"Autumn, baby, where are you?"

"I'm scared. I'm scared, mommy."

"Emily!" She heard Alison shouting.

Emily felt helpless. The two people she loved the most in the world were begging for her help, and she was paralyzed.

She felt them starting to disappear.

She grunted, gritting her teeth as she flopped over in bed.

She heard a loud ringing noise. Her phone screamed at her from her bedside.

She reached for it and answered it without looking.

"Alison?" She uttered, still half asleep.

"I'm sorry. Did I wake you?" It was Isaac's voice.

Emily blinked away the sleep in her eyes. Her brain was in a weird haze. She felt sweat dripping down her body.

Where am I? Is this real?

"How are you feeling?" he asked.

His voice sounded like a low buzz in her head. She blinked again, trying to figure out what was going on. The first thing that came into focus was a teddy bear.

The teddy bear had been in a gift basket that Nick brought by. The stuffed animal was holding a little heart that boldly stated "It's a Girl!"

It took her a minute to remember why she was so exhausted. Her mind was a fog. She vaguely recalled a nurse taking Autumn for a check-up.

"Isaac." Emily finally managed to find the vocal part of her brain.

"You sound kind of out of it. Are you okay?"

His concern was sweet. It made her smile.

"You worry more than an overprotective Jewish mother."

"I have earned the right young Bubula. You just pushed a whole human out of your body. And it's not like I'm right down the road so I can check in on you."

"No, but your little errand boy can." She yawned, rolling over.

"My what?" Isaac asked in confusion.

"Nick. He came by. Said you sent him to check in. I appreciate it, but I look like hell. Maybe next time you plan on sending him give me a little notice."

There was a blanket of silence on the line.

"Em, I haven't talked to Nick in three weeks."

"What?"

A terrible feeling washed over her body. Why would Nick lie?

The truth barreled down on her like a freight train.

Isaac hadn't sent Nick.

Courtney had.

"Autumn." Emily cried under her breath.

She felt a primal pain ripping her into pieces. Panic seeped into her veins. Her vision started to tunnel.

The last memory she had of her daughter was feeding her. Someone had ripped her directly from her bosom.

Not just someone.

Courtney.

She scrambled to sit up, dropping her phone. It clattered against the floor, cutting off the call with Isaac.

She felt a sharp pain in her chest. Her body felt cold. Empty. A spine-tingling chill wracked her so violently that she couldn't stop shaking.

When she looked down and saw her empty arms she felt an unbearable amount of pain. She remembered something about a nurse taking her for vitals, but it didn't feel right.

She pushed herself towards the edge of the mattress and yanked up her sweatpants. Her entire lower body felt like it was being ripped apart by glass, but she forced herself up on the side of the bed.

She was wide awake now, all traces of the drugs wiped out by her extreme terror.

"Autumn?" She called, as if the baby would answer her.

Her stomach felt rancid. She was going to puke.

"Autumn!" Her voice was broken, fragile.

She wasn't in the hospital bassinet next to her bed.

You're panicking. She tried to calm herself down, but she was hyperventilating. Mom took her. Dad is playing with her. Alison has her. She's safe.

But she knew in her heart it wasn't true.

A mother's intuition.

Courtney had her baby.

A guttural moan erupted from her throat, a cry so raw that it didn't even sound real to her ears. An unbridled anger drove her sheer will. Her face was wet with furious tears.

She bent down and grabbed her phone, ignoring a flashing call from Isaac. She shoved the phone into the pocket of her sweatpants.

She moved towards the door.

As she was reaching for the handle it flung open, two blobs of blonde hair rushing into the room.

At first glance Emily noticed that Alison was wearing Hanna's sweater.

Her brain couldn't process it. Her brain couldn't process anything. The shock was overwhelming her system.

Her daughter was in danger, but for some reason all Emily could do was stare at Alison, dumbfounded.

The blonde was a mess. Her hair was tangled and looked like it was caked in blood. Her knuckles were cracked and bleeding. Her lips were swollen, chapped, and peeling.

"Emily, thank God." Alison breathed a sigh of relief.

"What are you doing?" Hanna asked. "Get back in bed."

Emily ignored Hanna, all of her attention focused on Alison. She reached for Alison's hand, observing the bruises on her knuckles from where she'd been trying to beat her way out of the cold locker.

"You're bleeding." Emily mumbled in shock. "What happened? Did Courtney do this to you?"

"You know she's here?" Alison's eyes widened. "What did she do? Did she come after you?"

The pain returned to Emily's chest. She started gasping, wheezing, for breath. Only she wasn't breathing anymore. She was weeping.

Alison's face blanched. The look in Emily's eyes was utter devastation swimming with resolute anger. Alison felt the atmosphere shift. Her worst fears had been right.

She reached out and cupped Emily's tear-stricken face. Her fingers were still numb from being nearly frozen to death, but she could feel the wetness of her tears against her fingertips.

"What's wrong?" She clung to her, trying to keep her grip on reality as much as she was trying to help Emily keep her grip on hers.

She had never seen the brunette break as hard as she was at that very moment. Emily was petrified.

"She took her." Emily couldn't breathe. "She took Autumn."

Alison's stomach clenched. She dropped her hand away from Emily's face in shock.

"She what?" She had never felt such a visceral pain. The chills running down her spine were no longer related to what had happened in the morgue.

I'm too late.

She had failed Emily, and she had failed Autumn.

"That psycho bitch kidnapped her?" Hanna gawked.

"Nick is helping her." Emily glanced at the teddy bear. She wanted to rip its head off and shove it down Nick's throat.

"Oh my God." Hanna pirouetted around on her feet, taking in the room around them. She pulled her phone out. "Oh my God, we have to call the police."

"If we back Courtney into a corner I don't know what she'll to do to Autumn." Emily put her palm on Hanna's phone, lowering it.

Emily had seen what Courtney became when she was being denied something she wanted. And no one would be able to protect her baby. Autumn was defenseless.

She had an immobilizing fear, a terrible feeling that Courtney had already smothered her to death…

She cinched her eyes shut in pain at the thought of it. She couldn't fathom it. Alison could see the agony on Emily's face.

"I'll back her into a corner my damn self." Alison flew off in a rage. "If she so much as touches one hair on Autumn's head I will bash her skull in."

Her eyes drifted to the empty hospital crib. The blankets were crumpled up. Her heart felt like it was slowly being sliced in half. She could picture Autumn, scared, crying, begging for help. The sounds in her head were haunting.

"God, she must be so scared." Alison's lip quivered. She was angry. She was so angry. She didn't want to cry. She wanted to beat Courtney's ass. So why was she crying? "I'm scared," she uttered, not meaning to say it out loud, not meaning to pile on to Emily's misery.

"Me too." Emily reached for her sweatshirt.

She winced as she slipped the sweatshirt on over her head. Her chest was sore. And she was leaking, which made her wonder if her daughter was somewhere crying.

It hurt too much to think about. Alison saw her pain. She felt it. She touched her cheek.

"Em…" Alison said softly, not knowing how to curb her pain, not knowing what to do.

"We'll get her back." Emily choked out. She wasn't sure if it was true, but she needed it to be true.

Alison's throat felt like it was closing up. The gravity of the situation knocked her for a loop. Her anger could only do so much. She felt helpless.

"What are we going to do?" She faced Emily, tears spilling down her face. "She's so little. So helpless."

The words cut in to the brunette.

Courtney thrived on weakness. Emily shuddered thinking about it. She shuddered thinking about what Courtney was doing to her little girl at that very moment. What atrocities was she capable of? Courtney had done unspeakable things in the past. She had forced an immense amount of pain on her for years. Even when Emily drew clear lines the blonde wouldn't stop.

Emily made a noise between a choked cry and an angry snarl.

"I can't believe I let this happen…" She'd let her guard down.

"This is not your fault." Alison angrily cut her off. Her hand was on Emily's cheek again, gripping it passionately. "She's a fucking nut job. Nothing that has happened to you is your fault. Everything she did to you…everything she's doing…she deserves to rot in a cell."

Hanna watched the exchange curiously. Something about Alison's tone of voice shed light on some of Emily's past. She knew that Emily had some dark secrets, but it was only in seeing the pain on her friends' faces that she was able to get a deeper insight into the true dangerous nature of Emily's past.

"She won't get away with this. They are done hurting us." Alison slid her hand down to the side of Emily's neck.

They were both trembling. Fear. Pain. Agony. Terror. The unknown. Emily took a shaky breath, lowering her forehead to meet Alison's.

"If I lose her…"

"I won't let that happen." Alison shook her head tearfully.

She wasn't going to rest until Autumn was safely in their arms again. She was going to find Courtney and Nick, and when she did she was going to make them regret everything they had ever done to her family.

Alison pulled her phone out, looking at the broken screen, a crack that spanned across her girls' faces. The fractured image hit her particularly hard because that's what Courtney and Nick were trying to do to them. They were trying to break them.

"Hanna…" Alison glanced at the blonde. "Call Caleb. Tell him to hack every piece of technology in this place until he finds her. I'm going to tear this town apart looking for them, starting with this hospital."

Emily and Hanna didn't have an opportunity to argue with her. She grabbed an empty IV pole and twisted it, breaking the collapsable IV stand apart. She'd seen the nurses do it a few times. The end result was a long metal rod she could use as a weapon.

Emily hadn't seen her lose her temper in such an explosive fashion in a long time. She knew it festered beneath the surface. She knew that Alison had a dark side. And she knew that the blonde wouldn't stop until she was standing over Nick's and Courtney's bloodied, bruised, and broken corpses.

As she watched Alison pace out of the room she turned to Hanna. Hanna squeaked out a nervous cry.

"Emily, this is insane. It's gone too far. You need to call the cops." Hanna was breathing fast, panicking. "Am I crazy for being logical here?"

A strange sense of calmness washed over Emily. Her adrenaline was pumping. She knew that Hanna was right. She knew it was dangerous. But she also knew Courtney. She knew that at the first sign of trouble she would do something to hurt Autumn. She couldn't let that happen.

"Find the head nurse. Tell her what's going on, but tell her not to call the cops yet. Give us ten minutes."

"What are you going to do?" Hanna's eyes went wide.

"I'm going to stop Alison from getting arrested for double homicide and then get my baby back." She was going to show Courtney and Nick that they had messed with the wrong mother.

"You can barely walk…"

"This is my child. I'm not going to sit back and let them get away with this." She grabbed the other end of the IV pole. "Now are you with me or not? Because if I have drug you and tie your ass up I will." Her voice was strained, but strong. It was a strange contradiction.

Hanna touched her arm, and for a few seconds Emily thought she was going to have to follow through on her threat, but then Hanna nodded.

"I'm with you, Em. I'm always with you."

Emily managed a sad smile. Hanna could see the pain she was burying beneath the surface.

"What did she do to you?" Hanna's voice was small, quiet. It was very un-Hanna-like.

"It's complicated." Emily sighed. She shook her head. "I'm so sorry you were dragged into this."

"I walked into it willingly." Hanna squeezed her hand. "You're my best friend. And Autumn is…God, she's so pure." She bit her bottom lip, fighting back tears. "If anything happens to her…"

"It won't." Emily assured her. "Get with Caleb. See what he can do."

"Mona is here, too."

"Mona, too. Get with anyone you can find." She let go of Hanna's hand and moved towards the door.

"Hey…be careful."

Emily barely heard Hanna's warning as she raced after Alison. Instead of the throbbing post birth pain all she could feel was each beat of her heart as she stepped forward.

She didn't even have to think about which way Alison was going. Somehow, she just knew. She let her heart guide her. She caught up to her near the elevators.

Alison had thought about taking the stairs, but she knew she didn't have time to waste. The longer it took her to run through the hospital the further of a head start Courtney and Nick had.

She was waiting on the elevator when Emily found her. Alison's face was a blanket of pure rage, but when she saw Emily her expression softened. Every time she saw her girlfriend all she could see was Autumn's little face. She saw the metal pole in Emily's hand. She wasn't surprised to see her, especially given her daughter was in danger, but she was concerned.

"Em, you shouldn't push yourself too hard…"

"You're not doing this alone." Emily argued. She reached for Alison's hand. "We're a family, Ali. Ride or die."

Alison wasn't going to argue with her. She squeezed her hand.

The elevator dinged and they stepped on together.

As they were stepping on the elevator on the east end of the hospital, Nick was stepping off the elevator on the west end. He had figured out that Courtney stole a badge. He had been able to track her with the badge number. He knew she was smart enough to make her getaway without calling attention to herself. He saw that she'd used the badge on an employee exit.

His nose was buried in his phone. He didn't see the boy rushing down the hallway, also nose deep in his phone.

The two of them bumped into one another.

"Sorry – "

"My bad – "

They looked up at the same time. Nick recognized him. Caleb didn't recognize Nick, though there was a spark of familiarity he couldn't quite peg.

Nick muttered another apology, but scurried away before Caleb had more time to think about where they'd seen one another. He had been careful about trying to conceal his identity the day he veered into the bike lane and nearly took Caleb out. He'd had on a hat and a scruffy fake beard.

Caleb watched him round the corner, rubbing the back of his neck as he felt something hot creep up his spine. Something strange was needling him.

It didn't hit him until he was almost at the elevator.

The splash of paint on his shoes.

A memory flashed through his mind. The day he was laid out on the side of the road, his bike nearly twenty feet away from him, twisted metal and a broken chain.

He remembered him.

The man who called 911 after the hit and run.

The driver hadn't really fled the scene. He had been the driver. He'd been wearing sneakers with red paint on them.

Caleb shifted directions sharply, following his path. He grabbed his phone, texting Hanna.

Red Paint Shoes is here.

He wasn't expecting the response he got,

Autumn is missing. Call me. Now.

It was enough to stop him in his tracks. The boy hadn't had a baby with him. Had they been dealing with two people the whole time?

Caleb picked up where he left off, trying to find which way he went. Even if the boy didn't have Autumn, he might lead him to the infant.

He didn't have her, but he might be meeting up with someone who does. Tracking him.

He turned around, rushing back to where they'd run into each other. The hallway split into three different areas. The first led into a room with a vending machine and overflow seating. The second led to a large empty waiting room.

The third ended up at a locked doorway. Caleb observed the door. It was only accessible with a badge. He tried to break the code, but the badge scanner just screamed at him and flashed red.

He pulled up a map of the hospital, trying to figure out where the boy would have gone. After a few minutes he discovered that the hallway led to a walkway to a parking deck across the street.

Employee exit. Leads to the parking garage.

Hanna forwarded the text to Alison and Emily, hoping that they would make it in time.

o ~ O ~ o

The air outside was uncharacteristically warm. The top of the eight story parking deck was empty.

Courtney had remembered that there was an employee walkway on the third floor that led to the large structure. She'd gotten out to the garage and took the elevator all the way to the top. She wanted to show Autumn the world.

Autumn wasn't cooperating. She had been fussy ever since she walked out of the hospital with her. Her broken cries filled the air.

Courtney had been trying to get her to quiet down, but the baby wouldn't stop crying. She stared at her. She was so little. So helpless. So perfect.

And she was hers.

All hers.

She was sitting beneath an overhang, out of view of the rest of the parking garage. But the baby's cries were easy to hear on that end of the deck.

Nick heard her as soon as he stepped off of the elevator. He followed the noises, his hand firmly on the gun in his pocket.

Courtney heard him coming. She tried to make herself smaller and gripped the weapon she had in her pocket.

When Courtney and Nick saw one another they both let up on their guns. Courtney blinked, trying to figure out if he was real or a mirage. The lines of reality had been blurred for her for a while.

Then she remembered Alison being locked in the morgue.

He was really there.

She gave him a cool calculated glance, her eyes a mixture of intrigue and confusion, like she was trying to figure him out.

"You left Alison to die."

He wanted to tell her he'd done it for her, but he'd lost track of his reasons long ago. The blinding love he had for Courtney had kept him in the dark for so long. The curtains were slowly being peeled back, revealing a monster he'd never known behind them.

He was seeing Courtney in an entirely new light. He'd always known that she was in control. He'd never had a problem with it before. He had gotten off on it.

He'd always assumed they were a team. But they had never been equals. Courtney wasn't a pack animal. She was a predator who stalked other predators.

Even so, when Nick looked at her all he saw was the girl who had stolen his heart. She couldn't help the way she was any more than he could help the spell she'd put him under. Somewhere along the way he had fallen madly in love with her.

That's what he was now.

Mad.

Nick watched as Courtney quietly spoke to the baby, trying to calm her tears. Watching her with Autumn turned him on. It was a future he never thought he'd have with her.

Courtney shifted Autumn in her arms, startling the crying infant. Her cries turned into subtle whimpers. It was as if Autumn picked up on her tension and it scared her into submission.

"Look at her." Courtney stroked her cheek. "Isn't she beautiful?"

Her chubby cheeks were heated from all the crying she'd been doing. She was cold and hungry and upset. She hiccuped and started to whine again.

Nick leaned down to get a closer look at Autumn. He crouched in front of Courtney and slowly reached out to cup the baby's head.

The second he touched her Courtney sneered and jerked away from him, pulling the screaming infant closer to her chest. A throaty rumble filled the air as she shot him a warning glare. She had a feral look in her eyes, like an animal in the wild protecting its young.

Nick pulled back with a sigh.

It hurt him more than he cared to admit. He was beyond angry at Courtney for what she'd done to Darren, but the heartbreak he felt overshadowed it. He'd given his heart to Courtney. He'd done everything in the world for her.

The betrayal stung.

"Just tell me why you did it." Nick lifted his chin, looking Courtney directly in the eyes.

"Did what?" She blinked, an innocent look crossing her face, the same look she'd been using on him for years.

It was the same look that had gotten him to fall in line every time.

It wasn't going to work this time.

"Don't." He looked down at the cemented ground, trying to hide his grief. "Don't play dumb with me. Please. You know what finding my brother meant to me…"

Courtney peered at Autumn.

"He was trying to hurt her. He was trying to hurt her and I couldn't let him."

"He was behind bars!" Nick angrily exclaimed. "He wasn't a threat to anyone!"

His voice frightened Autumn. Her cries increased in volume.

"Shhh, you're scaring her." Courtney hissed. She bounced Autumn, cooing quietly. "Your brother was a loose cannon, Nicky…"

"Don't call me that." The way she said his nickname rubbed him the wrong way now that he knew the truth.

She stared at him, a reptilian look in her eyes. How had he never seen it before? She was so cold. So calculating. Had his dick made him that blind?

"Did you ever love me?" His voice was packed with emotion.

Courtney looked at him inquisitively. A wave of confusion crossed her face. She cocked her head and stared blankly at him. She tried to remember a time, any time, where she felt the way she felt about him that she felt about Emily.

"I tried." She took a thoughtful breath. "I wanted to."

She peeled her eyes away from him and looked down at Autumn. The baby was crying so hard that she was barely breathing. Courtney put her finger in Autumn's mouth, hoping it would act as a pacifier to calm her down.

"I didn't know how to." Tears gathered at the corner of Courtney's eyes. She slowly looked up at Nick. "I don't think I'm capable of loving anyone." Her voice tremored. "I think I'm broken."

When she looked at him with such pathetic eyes he couldn't help but pity her.

"I do feel something though…" She looked at Autumn. "For her." She hummed quietly. "Our sweet little girl."

It made Nick feel like clawing his eyes out.

His child was dead.

"You know she isn't ours, right?"

The baby squalled around Courtney's finger, her face turning red as her screams penetrated the air.

"Shhh. Shhh, don't listen to him, sweet baby." She tried to soothe her. She peered at Nick. "I love her. I love her and that's all that matters." She rubbed Autumn's gums, trying to get her to clamp down, trying to get her to be quiet. "I want her."

She wanted her the same way she'd wanted Emily. She'd spent all those sleepless nights in San Antonio thinking that it was Emily she needed. But now she knew…it wasn't Emily. It was Autumn. Because in Autumn, she would have a piece of Emily forever. She could mold her into whatever she wanted.

"She looks just like her. She looks just like her mom."

Nick sighed.

"It was always Emily wasn't it?" He bit angrily.

That fucking bitch had ruined everything.

"It's not my fault." Her voice was meek, quiet.

Was she toying with him? Did she mean it? He couldn't tell anymore.

It's never your fault. He thought to himself.

"She tricked me." Courtney puffed her lips out. She looked sad. Afraid. He felt the need to protect her. "She tried to hurt me."

"What? When?" He touched her arm, but she recoiled.

"She tried to make me more broken." Courtney blinked back tears. "She made me think it was my fault. She ruined me."

"Babe…" he said softly, trying once again to reach out to her, to touch her cheek. "You're not ruined…"

She stared at him, expressionless. Dull, yet sharp enough to cut into him.

She still felt nothing. He felt everything.

She was crazy, but he was just as crazy as she was. On a strange level, they were made for each other.

"She belongs with me. She's mine." Courtney whispered. "We can't let anyone take her from us."

Maybe Courtney was right. Maybe the baby was better off.

Nick pushed himself to his feet.

"I'm going to fix it. I'm going to fix it, baby." He stood up.

I'm going to fix YOU.

He'd always known she was broken. It's part of the reason he stayed with her. He was broken, too. And he was convinced that he could fix her.

"You just wait here, okay? No one will come up here. No one will see her. I'm going to get the car. We'll go somewhere no one can ever find us."

Courtney nodded absentmindedly. She watched him walk away. He turned the corner and climbed on the elevator.

o ~ O ~ o

Emily had gotten a surge of adrenaline when she got the text from Hanna about Caleb running into Nick. Though her body was sore, her spirit was more than willing. Her daughter was her heart, and she was able to put that above the aches and pains.

The sound of the traffic at the nearby highway was drowning out the sounds of Emily's pulse throbbing in her head.

Alison's heart sank when she saw the size of the parking garage. It was huge. How the hell were they supposed to find them? What if they were too late?

Emily surveyed the deck, her hand tightly gripping the breakaway IV pole she'd taken from her hospital room. Her father's military background kicked in. She could feel him guiding her, telling her what to do.

Get a lay of the land.

Cover all entrances and exits.

Send teams to scout from top to bottom.

Hanna, Caleb, and Mona were on their way to the other end of the deck from the front of the hospital.

Emily sent Hanna a text,

Can you guys take the first 4 levels? We'll take the upper levels.

Hanna had been waiting for her instructions. She answered right away.

Got your back. If we find her should I stab her in the face with my Jimmy Choos or hold her down and wait for you so you can throw the first punch?

Just do whatever you have to do to protect Autumn.

Got it. I'm gonna stab her in the face.

"Where are they?" Alison asked, wielding her metal pole out in front of her. It wasn't much, but she wasn't going to hesitate using it on the blonde.

"On their way. They're going to take the first four levels. We'll cover more ground if we split up." Emily grabbed Alison's arm and pulled her towards the elevators at the back of the parking deck.

As they were climbing on the rear elevators, Nick was climbing off of the elevators on the other end of the building. He narrowly missed running into Caleb, Hanna, and Mona.

Alison watched the elevator slowly crawl up each floor. When it got to the fifth level it stopped. Emily glanced at her.

"I'm going to start here and work my way up. You're on top."

Despite everything they were going through the first thing Alison thought about was a cheeky bedroom innuendo.

"Hmm…that's new. Usually you're top tier." She saw Emily's lip twitch into a slight smile.

She kissed Alison and stepped off the elevator. It was only when the doors were closing that Emily realized Alison hadn't been on a rooftop since New York. Alison had been iffy about heights ever since. She hadn't even thought to ask her if she would be okay. She pulled her phone out and immediately texted her.

I completely forgot about the heights thing. I can see if Hanna will switch out with you.

Alison hadn't even considered it herself, but when she got the message she knew it was too late to do anything about it.

No, we don't have that kind of time. I'll be fine. I can do this.

There was nothing she wouldn't do for Autumn.

Her eyes watched the floors change slowly. When she got to the top there was a loud dinging sound and then the doors slid open.

She felt a chill shoot down her spine when she stepped off the elevator. Goosebumps prickled her skin. Her hands were slick with sweat, so much so that she almost dropped the metal rod.

The wind was howling, like an echo taunting her. She closed her eyes and swallowed a lump in her throat.

She tried not to think about nearly plunging to her death from the rooftop in New York, but visions of the city streets flooded her mind. The moment Wilden had thrown her over the ledge. The moment she told Emily to let her go and save herself. The nausea-inducing view of the street beneath her.

She could hear the sounds of Rosewood traffic on the freeway below. She took an unsteady step forward. The wind whooshed around her, leaving her feeling dizzy.

But then she heard something that snapped her back into reality.

The muffled cries of Emily's daughter coming from the other side of the parking deck.

She still had her phone in her hand, gripping it tightly.

I hear her. She's here.

She sent the message to Emily and surged forward, her feet carrying her at speeds she didn't know she had in her.

As she raced towards the sounds of Autumn's cries, Courtney was trying her best to silence the sound. She had tried everything to get the baby to settle.

"You have to be quiet." Courtney frowned down at the infant. "You have to be a good girl. Don't be a bad girl. Bad girls get punished."

But Autumn wasn't listening. She was stubborn, like Emily.

Courtney pressed her hand over her mouth and Autumn kicked and threw her fists out in the air. Her face was the darkest shade of red that Courtney had ever seen.

"I don't know what to do." Courtney cried, exasperated. "I don't…I don't know what you want." She hugged her to her chest. "Are you hungry?"

She shifted, reaching in her shirt to grab her breast.

Her brain didn't make the connection that she didn't have milk. She couldn't give Autumn what she needed, but that wasn't going to stop her from trying.

As she was getting ready to lift her shirt she heard rapid footsteps approaching.

"Don't you fucking dare." An angry voice warned.

Courtney's head snapped up, her eyes meeting an icy blue glare. The angry blonde was charging her, wielding a pipe as a weapon.

When Courtney's eyes locked on hers Alison felt a sense of familiarity. It was the girl from the bar. The one who had lost her phone. The one who had threatened to key her boyfriend's car.

"Courtney…" Alison hissed under her breath.

They stared at one another, taking in their similarities and their differences. Alison was floored by how similar they were in appearance. She felt like she was looking in a funhouse mirror and getting a reflection of her worst self.

Courtney leaped to her feet, scuttling back towards the overhang near an open ledge. Alison felt her throat closing up. Was she crazy enough to jump?

All she could hear was Autumn's crying.

"Autumn, it's okay baby…"

"Shut up!" Courtney snapped. Her feet shuffled uneasily against the ground. She moved closer to the edge.

"Stop!" Alison pleaded, her eyes on the helpless crying child in her arms. Autumn was screaming, making noises that Alison had never heard her make. It caused a visceral twisting pain in her heart. "Please…" Her voice cracked. "Please don't hurt her."

"You think I would hurt her?" Courtney spit hatefully. "Emily is the one who tried to hurt her. I'm keeping her safe. Emily didn't want her. She didn't want her. I had to make her see. I had to force her to pay attention…"

"Like the way you tried to force yourself on her?" Alison bit angrily, her fingers flexing around the IV pole in her hand.

Alison knew that when Emily saw Courtney she saw Isaac's sister, but when she looked at the blonde all she saw was the monster who had hurt her girlfriend. Courtney had hurt Emily the way Wilden and Ian had hurt her. She looked at Courtney, and she understood the rage that Emily felt when she'd attacked Wilden. Alison could feel the anger coursing through her veins. She hurt Emily, and she was trying to hurt Autumn.

She gripped the pole harder, squeezing like a ballplayer would a baseball bat. The only thing that was keeping Alison from busting Courtney's skull open was Autumn's cries. The real and present danger she was in was the one thing that was keeping Alison's temper grounded.

"I know what you did to her." Alison was seething.

"I didn't do anything to her that she didn't want." Courtney sneered. "You're just jealous." She clutched the whimpering infant tightly. "You'll never have what we had. The heat. The passion…"

"You tried to rape her." Alison hissed.

"No!" Courtney argued. "No, I didn't! She wanted me to. I could feel it. Her…her body was begging me. Every time. I could tell. You can never make her feel the way I make her feel."

Alison felt the childish urge to make it clear that Emily was always satisfied when they got lost in the throes of their passion.

"That's not what she says when we're in bed together." Alison shot a smarmy look at Courtney. "She actually wants me." Anger flashed across Courtney's face. "And she actually consents…" Alison dug the knife in deeper.

Alison's harsh truths ignited a rage in the blonde.

"Our bodies were made for one another." She could picture the way Emily's skin felt underneath her fingertips. "I've felt her you know…felt what I do to her…"

"She will never love you."

"She'll always be mine." Courtney licked her lips. "I could have fucked her that night in the hospital with you right there in the room." She smirked. "I thought about it." She was always so beautiful when she was sleeping…unaware. "She was warm. So warm. I could feel her. She wanted me. She always wanted me. And it would have been so clandestine for me to claim her while you drooled into your pillow. It would have been so easy. Climb on her, lift her gown, make her feel so good…"

"Fuck you." Alison growled under her breath, rocking on her heels. Every instinct she had was telling her to lunge for her throat. "You had no right…"

"I had EVERY right!" Courtney screamed.

Her yells frightened the baby. Autumn started to scream again. For some reason, the cries jarred Courtney. It stirred up a dark dust in her mind. She looked at the crying child, and something in her stomach felt twisted…wrong.

What have you done?

What are you doing?

What have you become?

"No." Courtney growled. "Stop." She squeezed her eyes shut and took a step backwards towards the railing.

A rush of terror paralyzed Alison. She felt herself falling over the ledge in New York. She felt Autumn slipping over the edge. The fear gripped her deeply.

"Court…Courtney, step away from the ledge. You…you said you weren't going to hurt her. You're not going to hurt the baby, remember?"

But Courtney couldn't hear Alison's voice. She couldn't hear Autumn's cries. All she heard was the noises in her head.

You're broken.

You're diseased.

You don't deserve to live.

"It's loud." Courtney complained. "So loud." She looked down at the newborn. "Shhh…stop it." When the crying didn't cease Courtney got angry. "STOP IT!" She roughly shook her.

"You're hurting her!" Alison exclaimed, tears prickling her eyes.

She was so close, but she couldn't save her.

Courtney wildly shook her head.

"I can't…I can't hear myself think."

Autumn's cries were getting louder. Alison felt a rush of adrenaline, her instincts pushing her to save the little girl, no matter the cost.

Autumn was so scared. She was so little.

Alison had been that little before. She had been scared. She hadn't had anyone to protect her.

"Don't." Alison felt a sob ripping out of her throat.

Courtney blinked, squinting at Alison, like she was unsure if she was really there.

Abomination.

"This isn't right," Courtney mumbled to herself. "This isn't…" She groaned. "This was supposed to be different. You're not right." She looked down at Autumn and quietly repeated, "You're not right."

Alison took a step forward.

"Don't! Don't come near us!" She jerked roughly towards the edge.

Autumn's sock slipped off her foot and sailed down eight stories below. Alison let out a startled gasp. It could have been the baby falling to her death.

"Why won't she stop crying?" Courtney's eyes teared up.

"She's scared." Alison's voice was trembling, in fear, in anger. "Just…let me…"

"I said don't come any closer!" Courtney screeched out a warning.

She gripped the ledge, her eyes darting down to the freeway below.

"Okay." Alison nodded. "Okay, I'm staying right here. Why don't…can you come to me? I can calm her down."

Courtney didn't seem to hear her. She stayed at the corner, hair whipping in the wind. Alison was on the cusp of screaming. One gust of wind in the wrong direction and Courtney would go over, taking Autumn with her.

She tried to stay calm, but internally she was panicking. She was spiraling. She had no idea what to do.

It was only when she heard Emily's voice, a quaking thunderous warning, that she realized she wasn't alone.

"Courtney! You get your hands the hell off of my daughter right now!"

Courtney's head snapped up at the sound of her voice. She licked her lips and swallowed, a dry cottony breath that got caught in her throat as she watched Emily sidle up next to Alison.

She was panting, out of breath. She'd jogged the entire way from the other side of the parking garage, her body barely able to handle the strenuous physical activity. Her entire bottom half was throbbing in pain, but she'd heard her baby in need and that's all it took.

"You're not supposed to be here." Courtney squeezed Autumn close to her body, muffling her cries.

Autumn jerked her head away from Courtney's chest, flashing her red wet cheeks at her mother.

An insurmountable amount of wrath flew across Emily's face when she saw her daughter's terrified little expression. She was too little to know what was happening, but she was definitely scared. Her screams tore into Emily and Alison. It was horrifying to be a parent and feel so helpless to help your child.

The pain on Emily's face was palpable.

"You're hurting her." Emily's voice quivered, an undertone of eerily calm anger and absolute terror. "She doesn't understand what's happening. She's scared."

"She's only scared because you are trying to take her away…" Just like she'd taken away a part of her in the locker room.

Courtney leaned towards the edge of the open overhang. Alison and Emily both cried out and threw their hands up.

"I won't let you take her." Courtney curled her fingertips into Autumn's blanket, knotting it up.

She moved closer to the ledge.

Emily felt her heart pumping wildly in her chest. She wanted to rush forward and tackle her, but if she did that she would send her over the edge.

"What do you want? I'll give you anything. Anything but her. Please." Emily felt her throat burning as she fought back tears. "Take me. Take me instead. That's what you always wanted, right? That's what this entire thing has been about? Making me pay? So do it. Do whatever you want to me. I'll do anything you ask. You can have me. Just let her go."

"Emily…" Alison uttered under her breath. She was afraid of what Courtney would do to Emily if she got her hands on her.

"It's too late now." Courtney stared at the vast open space overlooking the freeway.

"Why are you doing this?" Emily choked, looking desperately at her daughter.

If it came to it she would dive off of the building after her. She'd never known the ferocity of love until she'd met her child.

"Because you don't listen. You never listen. You shouldn't be with her." She shot a hateful look at Alison.

Emily saw Alison retract in to herself. That's what Courtney did to people. She latched on to insecurities and buried people with them.

The brunette reached for Alison's free hand, firmly grasping it, leaving no doubt in Alison's mind that they belonged together. Alison squeezed Emily's hand back, a gentle reminder that none of what was happening was on her.

"You don't belong with her, and you didn't belong with Maya. This is your fault…" Courtney snapped. "This never would have happened if you hadn't picked Maya at that stupid party."

It all went back to that party. Things would have been so different if she'd just made Emily love her that night.

"Picked…Maya? When did I…"

Courtney watched the realization wash across Emily's face.

A memory buried deep in her subconscious about the night she'd been drugged. A gentle flicker on her cheek and Courtney whispering something.

"You're mine. You're mine and no one else can touch you."

"It was you." Emily let go of Alison's hand and flipped the IV pole rod up horizontally in between her hands, holding it like a railing, ready to charge Courtney. "You drugged us that night."

"I wasn't going to hurt you. I didn't hurt you. You were supposed to be mine, but then those idiot frat guys showed up. And they ruined it. They tried to ruin you. You were so exposed. So vulnerable. Anything could have happened to you. I saved you. I made them confess. But you stayed with Maya. And Isaac." She rolled her eyes. "God, he was so self-righteous about it. He was too stupid to see…to see what you are."

Alison could feel every blow that Courtney was trying to deliver. She knew that Emily had it rough back in San Antonio, but hearing what she'd been dealing with and experiencing it were two different things. She had a newfound respect for the strength that Emily had. No wonder she sought out adventures. No wonder she jumped over ravines and sped around on her motorcycle. No wonder she had no problem throwing punches and jumping in headfirst without fear.

She'd known true fear back in Texas.

"I had to show you, my sweet angel…"

"She's not your goddamn angel." Alison growled. She wanted to rip Courtney's face off. "She never was. She never will be. And that little girl you're holding doesn't belong to you either. You don't deserve to be in their presence."

Courtney didn't acknowledge Alison. She didn't give her the satisfaction.

"I liked it better when you were fucking Maya. At least she had the sense to stay gone after we sent her away."

It shouldn't have shocked Emily, but it did.

"You planted those drugs?"

Courtney's days of torturing her from the shadows extended way beyond what had started in Rosewood.

"I had to drug her in DC because you were being bad." Courtney scowled. "That's what happens to bad girls…" She looked down at the squirming newborn in her arms. She slowly looked up at Emily again. "It was poetic to do it to two of your girlfriends in one night." She glanced at Alison. "Little tip, don't let your drinks or your phone out of your sight in honkey tonk bars…"

"You fucking bitch." Alison sneered.

"Don't you see, Emily?" Courtney tenderly pet Autumn's head, oblivious to her pained cries. "You are mine. You've always been mine. And no one else can have you. Everything you are…" She looked down at Autumn, "…everything she is…is mine. But if I can't have you then no one can."

Autumn's face scrunched up, her gasping wheezing cries clutching a broken part of Emily's heart that she feared would never be whole again.

"Courtney, you can do whatever you want to me. I don't care. Just please let her go. She doesn't deserve this. She's just a baby." Emily begged.

"We were all babies once." Courtney traced her finger against Autumn's jaw.

Seeing Courtney touch her daughter made every hair on Emily's body stand on end. All she could think about was all the times Courtney had touched her, had made her recoil…made her skin crawl. All the times she'd pushed her…hurt her.

She had assaulted her.

More than once.

"Stop it." Emily took a step forward. "Just stop it. This isn't right." She desperately tried to appeal to a sense of humanity that Courtney didn't have. "I know you know this isn't right."

"It's painful, isn't it?" Courtney questioned. "Knowing that you'll never see your baby again…having her ripped away from you…"

"I am begging you, please…don't take her from me." She was short of falling on her knees to plead.

"I told you, you don't deserve her." Courtney adjusted the hat on Autumn's head.

Emily felt a twisting pain in her stomach, a vivid memory.

"It's not you I'm interested in." Courtney had said to her in her nightmare after the Halloween dance. "You don't deserve her."

"I told you that you wouldn't be able to keep her safe." Courtney glared at Emily.

"Oh my God…you were really there that night." Emily's hand automatically shot to her stomach. It was strange that her baby bump was gone. She still had an urge to protect her womb.

"It's amazing how accurate a simulation of contractions can be with the right machine."

Emily flinched. Preying on the fears of an expectant mother. It was perhaps the worst thing she'd ever done.

"I know it hurt. It hurt me, too." Courtney looked down sadly at Autumn as she bounced her in her arms. "It hurt me more than anything. She was too little. Far too little. And there was too much blood. So much blood on the floor."

Emily felt a pit in her stomach when she thought about the night she'd almost lost Autumn. She didn't realize that Courtney had lived through her own hell in which she actually lost her baby.

"I had a plan. I had a plan where it would have been me and Nicky forever…but then you ruined it. You attacked me in the locker room and I lost her…"

The words didn't register at first.

I lost HER.

Courtney had always had an unhealthy attachment to Emily. She had begged her on more than one occasion not to leave her. But something about the way she'd said "I don't want to lose you TOO…" the night Emily left San Antonio was coming back to her.

She wasn't talking about Nick that night.

She thought of something Noel had told her after she passed out at school.

"People go off the deep end when they lose a child. Do some crazy shit. I read this one story about some lady who posed as a nurse and kidnapped a newborn after she had a miscarriage. It apparently messes with all kind of things in a woman's brain when they lose a baby."

Courtney had never been emotionally stable, but something else had thrown her mental health off-course. Hormones.

She had lost a child.

"You…" Emily put it together,nauseated and pained at the thought of it. "You were pregnant."

That's what she and Nick had been fighting about Christmas. She remembered the dull look he'd had in his eyes when he told Emily he was in it with Courtney for the long game.

"Until you hurt me," she said. "I had never been sad before." She looked conflicted. "You made me sad. And then…then you made me angry. I saw you going into that devil place."

The crowd of protestors at Planned Parenthood. Courtney had been somewhere hidden in the sea of faces. That's how she knew about her pregnancy.

"I lost my baby and you were going to get rid of yours! That's when I knew…I knew I had to protect her." She cradled Autumn's cheek, stroking it.

"Don't touch her!" Emily growled, her voice cracking.

"This baby belongs with family." Courtney squeezed the crying infant, exacerbating her screams. "She belongs with me."

Autumn's fear was slowly destroying Emily's soul. She wanted more than anything to hold her in her arms, to cradle her and kiss her and tell her that everything was okay.

The sight of her tears was almost too much for her to handle. The sounds of her cries were excruciating. To be so close, but to be unable to answer her call for help ripped into her.

"I'm her family." Emily snapped. "I'm her mother. And there is no way in hell I'm letting you take my child from me. This ends tonight. Right now. You'll have to go through me to get out of here. And I will cut you open from stem to sternum to stop you."

Courtney's lips twitched, a smile on her face. Emily's aggression made her heart beat faster. The monster she kept inside was coming out to play. It's when Emily was at her best.

There she is. There's my Killer.

"She's not the only one you're going to have to go through." Alison raised the metal pole in her hand.

Emily gave a little nod of approval. They were a united front, and nothing was going to break them apart, especially not with Autumn's life at stake.

Courtney narrowed her eyes at the blonde. It was a glaring reminder that Alison was standing where she should have been standing.

They're trying to take her.

"No." Courtney shook her head and bit down until her jaw hurt.

She can't have her. You can't let her have her.

"No!" She yelped a little louder.

She looked down at Autumn. Her bright grey eyes were watery and sad, but Courtney didn't know why. All she knew was that she had a claim over her.

Mine.

She had the urge to grab her chin and scream at her. She was so small and so fragile. It would be so easy to snap her little neck to get her to be quiet.

You want me. You want me. I'm your mommy.

But Emily was screaming something different,

"She's not your child. I'm sorry about your baby, Courtney. I am. But you can't just replace your baby with my daughter."

Emily's words enraged Courtney. It made her want to punish her. She looked at the crying child in her arms.

Part of her wanted to coddle her, hold her against her chest, feel her little mouth against her breast so she could feel the connection that Emily felt to her. The other part of her hated her. She hated that this baby existed when hers was gone forever. She wanted to hurl her off the side of the parking deck. She wanted to see her little body broken and mangled, because she wanted Emily to feel what she felt.

She slowly looked up at Emily, her eyes cold and dark. She pressed her lips into an angry thin line as she took a step towards the ledge.

Want.

Emily had taken everything from her. Now she would do the same to her. She would make Emily understand what it meant for a heart to hurt. She would make her see that she existed only for her pleasure.

Need.

The wind made her balance unsteady. She wobbled on her feet.

"AUTUMN!" Emily was screaming.

Her eyes were glossed over with tears. She tried to lunge forward, but Alison grabbed her as she stumbled on her feet. Emily dropped the weapon she was holding, nearly collapsing.

Alison had visions of Emily taking a swan dive off of the building, somehow wrestling the baby out of Courtney's arms mid-air, and wrapping her body around her protectively, sacrificing her life for Autumn's as they hit the ground.

Emily's screams were piercing.

Alison was screaming, too.

"No!" Emily yelled. "NO, NO, NO! TAKE ME! PLEASE TAKE ME INSTEAD!"

Mine.

Courtney slowly dangled Autumn towards the edge.

The rush of the cold wind startled the infant. She suddenly became very still in Courtney's hands. She puckered her little quivering lips, pouting.

A peculiar feeling washed over Courtney as she stared at the helpless little creature in her hands. She thought of the frog outside the church. The ladybug on the day that Isaac and Emily broke up.

She saw something in Autumn she didn't see in them.

She saw curious eyes of empathy looking back at her. An innocent child with the wonders of the world in her beautiful knowing eyes. A heart with unlimited capacities for love. A soul. She'd never been able to recognize it before. She didn't know what it felt like to have humanity.

Broken. I'm broken.

"COURTNEY!" Emily sobbed. "COURTNEY PLEASE DON'T!"

The words brought a memory back. The night in Emily's house…the last night she'd been with her. She'd wanted to make love to her. And Emily had wanted it, too.

At least, she thought Emily had wanted it. But memories were becoming muddied, darker. She became a twisted version of herself in her mind. She saw herself ripping Emily's clothes off as she cried, forcing herself on her, doing terrible things.

"Courtney, please don't…"

She had hurt Emily. Alison was right. She'd done terrible things to the brunette. She'd brutally assaulted her.

Courtney blinked.

It could have been seconds. It could have been hours. Time felt like a concept, not a reality. But she slowly stepped back from the edge.

Her head was pounding.

She was crying.

Why was she crying?

It's not going to stop.

It's never going to stop.

You have to make it stop.

The pressure in her brain and the pressure in her body were pulling her apart. She grunted in frustration.

"I don't understand." She slapped her forehead with the fleshy part of her palm. She tugged at her hair roughly. "It's too loud. How do I make it stop?"

Emily timidly stepped forward, her chest still heaving, her eyes trained on her daughter.

"You have to let go," she spoke softly. "You just have to let her go."

Courtney cocked her head. Autumn was fussing again, but her cries meant something. Her cries reached a part of her that only one other person had ever been able to reach.

You're beautiful. You're so beautiful. You're just like your mommy.

But then…if Autumn was just like Emily, what did that mean about her feelings? What would she do to the baby? Would she be able to control herself? She had never been able to control her urges before.

When she touched the infant she felt the same surge of desires that drove her to do bad things to Emily. She wanted to do the same things to Autumn, because she looked at her and she saw Emily.

The thoughts she had weren't normal. She knew they weren't normal. She'd always known. She'd just never been able to look in the mirror and admit it.

She would do terrible things to Autumn, just like she'd done terrible things to Emily. She couldn't be trusted.

"I'd never hurt her," Courtney whispered out loud. She looked up at Emily, a broken expression on her face. "I just want her to be safe. I tried…I wanted to protect you. I just wanted our family to be safe."

"Then give her to me." Emily took another step forward, arms outstretched. Her hands were shaking.

Courtney stared at the pitiful child in her hands. She was tiny. And fragile. And she wouldn't be able to fight back. Not like Emily. Courtney could mold her into whatever she wanted.

She won't be able to stop you.

Emily was getting closer. Courtney could see the fear in her eyes. Her soft expression was locked in on her baby, her sole focus. Her heart.

What must it be like to love like that?

Let go.

It wasn't her voice this time.

It was Emily's.

Something about it was peaceful.

Just let her go.

Letting the baby go was perhaps the best thing she could do. She knew she was a monster. If she left with the child there was no telling what she would do to her.

She didn't want that. She'd never wanted that.

Children were pure.

Innocent.

Unspoiled.

She wouldn't destroy Autumn. She wouldn't take her innocence.

"Hey…" Courtney looked down at the unsettled newborn. "It's going to be okay," she said quietly, gently bouncing her in her arms.

She leaned down, kneeling on the ground. She stroked the blanket and then touched Autumn's stomach.

Autumn stopped crying long enough to look at her, furrowing her tiny brow. She looked exactly like Isaac when she scowled.

It hurt to let her go, but she forced herself to do it, because Autumn wasn't hers.

She placed the newborn against the cold cement, still wrapped in her blanket, and then she moved to the side, away from the ledge.

Emily practically fell over her feet to get to her daughter. She scooped her up into her arms.

"Oh, baby." Tears flooded her face as she cupped Autumn's head. Her cries tapered off. "It's okay. You're okay now. Shh, mommy's right here."

Autumn stopped crying and settled in Emily's arms. Her squalls turned into quiet whimpers. Emily caressed her cheek as she rushed away from the danger. Alison met her halfway.

"Is she okay?" Alison hovered, her hands all over the baby, searching for any signs of injury. "Is she hurt?"

"She's okay." Emily felt like a huge weight had been lifted. A wave of relief flooded her. Her daughter was safe in her arms. Autumn was taking quick shallow breaths. Her nose was stopped up.

"Hey, you're safe, baby." Alison cooed.

She rubbed her index finger against Autumn's tiny little palm. The baby immediately latched on to Alison's fingertip. She knew who was talking to her. She knew she was safe with her mommies.

They were so wrapped up in the baby that they almost didn't notice Courtney trying to slink towards the exit.

Alison's vision flashed in the heat of the moment, a rage she'd been containing for the sake of Autumn. But the baby was safe now.

And all bets were off.

She channeled every last ounce of anger she had and set her sights on the blonde.

"Oh no you don't."

There was not a world in which Alison was going to let her go free, not after what she'd done to the people she loved.

She didn't want to live in constant fear anymore. She didn't want Emily and Autumn to be in danger anymore.

In a flash, she was next to the blonde, slamming her against the wall, pressing the steel metal rod against her throat, cutting off her airway.

"I should kill you where you stand for what you did to her…to them." She quietly threatened under her breath.

Alison's attack opened up something inside of Courtney. She sneered at Alison and retaliated, reaching up and grabbing a fistful of hair on the back of her head. It was still tender from Nick's attack. Courtney headbutted her in the mouth, splitting her lip. Alison's teeth left a gash in Courtney's head, but she didn't feel it. She didn't feel the blood trickling down her face.

Alison let out a yelp and pulled the pipe away, swinging wildly. The metal rod hit her in the ribs. It knocked the wind out of Courtney, but she had enough strength to claw at Alison's neck, scratching her skin open and drawing blood.

Alison reared back and hit her again, this time striking her kneecaps, just like she'd learned in self-defense with Aria.

Courtney crumbled, falling to the ground. Alison raised the bar above her head, ready to deliver the final blow.

"Ali, don't!" Emily called out to her.

Alison stopped in her tracks. She looked at Courtney sniveling on the ground in front of her. As much as she wanted to murder her, she thought about what it would do to Isaac. Emily cared about him. She didn't want to hurt him. And she wanted to be around for Autumn. She couldn't do that if she was in jail.

She wiped some blood away from her lips and backed away, moving to Emily's side. She looked down at Autumn. Her face was wet and red from all the crying, but she was calm.

Emily wordlessly reached up and touched Alison's busted lip, tracing her finger over it. Her eyes flickered in anger.

"It doesn't hurt." Alison assured her. "All I care about is her." She touched Autumn's cheek. "I just want it to be over."

"It is." Emily assured her, eyeing Courtney, who was still reeling from Alison's attack. She shifted Autumn in her embrace. "I need you to take her."

Alison didn't argue. She extended her free hand, keeping her other hand tightly on the weapon. Courtney wouldn't be getting anywhere near her. She'd bash her head in.

Emily gently passed the baby over to Alison. She was so enamored with Autumn that she didn't see Emily pressing the elevator button.

"Call 911," Emily said calmly as she guided Alison to the elevator.

"What?"

"Get Autumn somewhere safe. And call the police." Emily's eyes darted over towards Courtney, who was trying to pull herself to her feet. "I'm going to make sure she doesn't go anywhere."

"Emily, I'm not leaving you alone with her…"

"She wrecked me." Emily kept her tepid gaze on the blonde. "I refuse to let her wreck my daughter." She rubbed her arm and sighed. "This has to stop. She needs help. I owe this to Isaac."

Alison nodded silently. The elevator was slowly climbing the floors. They could hear the buzzing noise getting closer.

They heard a shuffling sound behind them. Courtney had managed to get to her feet. She was inching towards them, a soft vulnerable sadness in her eyes.

"Can I say goodbye?" She asked. "I didn't get to say goodbye to you when you left. I…I didn't get to say goodbye to my baby."

She moved a step closer towards them, stretching her hand towards the baby in Alison's arms. Alison cradled Autumn protectively and held up the weapon in her hand. She wasn't letting her anywhere near the baby.

Before she could take a swing a flashing light blinded her. The sounds of a gunning engine and then squealing brakes echoed in the air. The driver's side door of a dark sedan flung open and someone in a doctor's coat lunged out of the front seat.

Nick saw Alison and Emily gunning for Courtney. He saw the blood on his girlfriend's face. He tunneled in on the girls, gun in hand.

Alison looked past the headlights and saw him.

The boy from the bar.

Cole.

At least, that's what he'd told her. What he didn't tell her was that it was his middle name.

"Nick, no!" Emily screeched.

Nick. Nick was Cole? Cole was Nick?

Alison had only seen one photo of him, after the night at the bar. He'd looked radically different in the photo. Since then he'd cut his hair, grown some facial hair, and traded his signature Panic At the Disco emo look for a Frat boy façade.

He blended in.

That's how he'd gone around Rosewood unnoticed. He was a chameleon.

Alison blinked, her mind processing slowly because of the shock weighing her down. She was frozen in place in front of the elevators.

She couldn't think. She couldn't move.

It happened in the blink of an eye. Later Alison would look back on it and wonder how much time had passed from when she'd first seen the gun to the first shot being fired. She would ask herself how they'd gone from the most joyous day in their lives to a violent attack ending in bloodshed and a body count.

She saw her life flash before her eyes. She'd always thought that was just a bad cliché that happened in books and movies, but she thought of nothing and everything all at once, and if someone asked her to describe it she wouldn't have been able to. But it wasn't just her life she saw. It was Emily's. It was Autumn's.

Nothing flashed through Emily's mind. She reacted solely out of instinct. It wasn't even a question. Protect her girlfriend and her child.

Emily wrapped her arms around Alison and the baby and shielded them with her body. She heard two shots and a muddled voice she thought was Alison screaming, "No!"

She waited for the inevitable pain, but her adrenaline was pumping so hard that it kept her from feeling it.

When she turned around she saw Courtney standing in front of them, her back towards them. The blonde was slowly spinning around. There was something shiny in her hand. She uncurled her fingers and the handgun slipped out of her palm.

The gun hit the ground. Alison flinched, expecting it to go off.

Beyond the weapon there was a large lump on the ground where Nick had been standing. He was still brandishing a gun in his hand. His fingers were gripping it tightly, but his hand was completely still…just like the rest of him.

His eyes were frozen, open, focused on the sky above him. Blood pooled around his neck, running down the incline of the parking garage.

Emily made a strange guttural noise in shock. The boy next door was dead. It drudged up an equal mix of pain and relief. It was like pouring alcohol on a fresh wound. It hurt, but when the pain wore off there was a cool sense of relief.

Nick hadn't always been a bad guy. He'd been her friend once. Something had happened between the day he plopped down on her front porch steps and now. But she would never get the chance to ask him why he'd turned on her.

Emily looked at Courtney again. The blonde had a peculiar look on her face.

A puddle of red liquid flowered out on her chest. Courtney looked down at it and touched her fingertips to it. When she pulled them away they were soaked in blood.

"Oh." Her expression was a strange sense of fascination mixed with shock.

"Courtney." Emily gasped.

It hadn't been Alison who was screaming.

It had been Courtney.

She'd saved them.

But why?

The elevator beeped, the doors slowly opening.

"Get Autumn out of here." Emily shoved her towards the open doors. "Get help."

Alison didn't have a chance to argue. The second she started to protest she felt Autumn wiggling in her arms. She looked down at the baby.

She didn't remember getting on the elevator, but she remembered seeing Emily mouth the words I love you as the doors closed.

Courtney stumbled towards Emily. Emily automatically stretched her arms out, ready to catch her.

They both fell to the ground. Emily felt a shockwave of pain in her pelvis and abdomen. She knew immediately some of her stitches had ripped.

Courtney's entire body tensed up. Her hands were trembling. She shook violently as Emily pulled her into her lap.

"I…" She whimpered. "…I killed him." She thought she should feel something, but she didn't. "He shot me." Her eyebrows angled down in confusion. "How could he…why…why would he…I…I didn't know he would…"

Emily should have been grateful that Courtney had jumped in front of them, but she was furious.

"Goddamn it, Courtney."

Goddamn it. Goddamn her for making her feel something when she should have been the one who was pulling the trigger. Goddamn her for making her care. After everything Courtney had put her through, she was still going to cry for her on her deathbed.

The complexities of their lives would always be intertwined. The scope of her emotions was too hard for her to grasp. That Courtney was willing to kidnap her child, destroy her mentally, and then turn around and give her life for her…it was more than she could handle.

"Why did you do that?" Emily growled. "What were you thinking?"

She should have been relieved that it was over. She knew she should have been relieved, but when she looked down at the shivering girl in her arms she saw her true vulnerabilities.

Emily's compassion was her fatal flaw. She shouldn't have felt an ounce of pity for Courtney, but when she peered into her eyes she saw something she'd never seen before. There was a light in them, a reckoning of some kind.

Courtney was calm in her response.

"I had to…" She clutched Emily's arm, her fingernails digging into her skin, but she wasn't trying to hurt her. She was trying to bury her own pain. "Because I understand now. For the first time in my life I know what it is…"

"Know what what is?" Emily's voice was trembling.

Courtney's grip loosened. She lifted her thin nimble fingers, the same fingers that had inexplicably hurt Emily…had made her skin crawl, had been in places that Emily had never wanted them to be.

This time her touch was soft. Those once harsh fingers gently found Emily's chin. She smiled as she stroked her face.

"Love." Courtney's eyes started watering. "Nick never understood." Her eyes searched for Nick, but she couldn't seem to focus on anything other than the brunette. "It was always you."

She made a strange gurgling sound, like she was choking on something.

"You deserved better. I'm sorry that I couldn't be a better person…that I couldn't love you like you deserved to be loved. But I did try. I just wanted you to love me. I never…I never meant for it to go this far. I never would have let them hurt you, Emily. That's why…I had to. They deserved to die…"

They

She wasn't just talking about Nick.

"You shot Wilden," Emily said. "You shot him, and when that didn't work you killed him to protect us."

Courtney nodded.

"I couldn't let him hurt the baby." She touched Emily's stomach. It was empty now. It was empty, like how she felt. "I tried to help you when I could. I thought…when I found you in your apartment…I thought you were going to die. I thought you were both going to die."

Emily tried to put pressure against the hole in her chest. The blood soaked through her fingers. When she saw the thin red substance against her skin she felt her soul being yanked back to the apartment, her fingers coated in her own blood.

She wasn't alone that night.

"You were serious. You really were trying to protect me."

"I messed up. I messed everything up. That's what I do…"

Wrong.

Broken.

Abomination.

"It hurts." She took short heaving breaths. "Oh God, it hurts. Make it stop hurting."

"I'm trying. I can't get the bleeding to stop…" Emily frantically held her palm against Courtney's chest.

"Not that." Her icy eyes glazed over, tears threatening to spill down her face. "I can't make it stop. It won't stop. Why can't I make it stop? It's so loud." She cried. She sucked in a harsh breath and whimpered.

Cognitive dissonance.

To be aware that something was wrong, but to not understand it. She both loved and hated Emily all at once, and it was too powerful for her brain to comprehend. That's what she'd been dealing with.

It was also why, despite everything she'd done to Emily…that Emily didn't want her to die. The difference between Emily and Courtney was that Courtney wouldn't feel a damn thing if someone died for her, but Emily would have her death weighing on her conscience for the rest of her life.

"I'm so…I'm sorry." Courtney's bottom lip quivered. She bared through her teeth, fighting the pain. "You don't have to forgive me." Her voice was soft. "I wouldn't."

Emily's silence answered for her. She would never be okay with everything Courtney put her through.

"I'm sorry." She repeated. "I'm so sorry. I'm sorry…" she uttered it like a mantra.

Emily waited, wondering if Courtney would have the dignity to apologize for all her victims, including her brother. But Courtney didn't seem keen on making amends with her family. She didn't even apologize for what she'd done to Nick. The only person she cared about was Emily.

"I'm cold." Her teeth were chattering. "I'm so cold."

Emily stroked her head, quietly shushing her.

"Courtney…hey…" She touched her cheek. "You're okay. You're going to be okay."

Courtney blinked in confusion. Something didn't seem right. But she was in Emily's arms. That felt right. It felt real to her. So that's what she focused on.

"I'm going to call Isaac, and your mom and dad. They'll come…"

"They hate me. Everyone hates me. I don't…I don't blame them. I know what I am. I've always known."

"They're your family," Emily said.

"You were the only family I ever had."

Emily bit her inner lip. The words were like a cruel joke, yet she knew that Courtney believed them.

But what was she supposed to do? Deny a dying girl's last fantasy?

"Your baby…she's just like you. I could see it…in her eyes. She has my brother's temperament. Her eyes are so soft. His eyes…his eyes were like that. She…she'll be good. Not like me. She won't be bad. She won't be like me."

"Don't talk like that…"

"I protected her." Courtney sucked in an uneven breath. "She's safe, right?" she asked. "I saved her?"

"She's safe." Emily nodded.

There was no way in hell anyone was getting that baby out of Alison's arms. She would destroy anyone who tried. Emily knew she would protect her.

"I couldn't save my baby." Courtney wept, though she wasn't sure why. Was it because she was dying? Was it because she missed her baby? Was it because she was finally facing her true self?

Emily saw the true pain of grief on her face. The loss of her child. She knew the look. She'd seen it in the mirror when she thought she was losing Autumn. And the loss of a child was not something she would wish on anyone, not even her worst enemy.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." Emily placed her hand against Courtney's cheek.

Emily felt hollow as she uttered the words. To sit on a rooftop with the girl who had tormented her, abused her, and made her life a living hell…to hold her and feel sympathy as she laid dying…it felt ridiculous. But Emily's mind was complex, and she was layered enough to know that she could hate Courtney for what she'd done to her, but that she could acknowledge that she had pain of her own. She could unapologetically admit that Courtney deserved everything she brought down on herself, but still feel sorry that she lost her child.

The compassion that Emily felt outweighed her anger, but the rage was still there. Courtney had put her child in danger, and that's something she would never forget. She would never forgive her. She hated Courtney, but she didn't want her to die.

Tears trickled down her face, though she tried to stop them. She was angry at herself for crying over Courtney. She didn't know why she was crying. Relief. Grief. Both.

"You do care." Courtney saw the tears. She touched a droplet on Emily's chin. "I…I should have told you I loved you. I should have meant it." She shuddered. "I never wanted to hurt you. I don't know what's wrong with me."

"You just need help. That's all. We can do that. We can do that for you." Emily begged her to hold on.

"I was a mistake."

"No." Emily brushed her hair aside. "No, God doesn't make mistakes."

Her mother had taught her that.

"Everything I did to you," she said, her breath shallow. "I hurt you. I know I did." There was a gurgling sound in her throat. Blood pooled at the corners of her mouth. "I'll never force you to do anything again. I promise. I just…" She reached up, her hand searching for Emily's face. "I need you. I need…I need one last time…"

"Courtney…" Her tone wavered. She wanted to beg her not to make her make that choice.

"Emily, please." She whimpered. I need to know. I need to know what real love feels like. "You're the only one in my life who ever understood me. You…you were…" She gasped for air. "You were the only person I ever felt anything for. You…you're special…so special to me. I…I love you…"

Courtney lifted her chin, her eyes locked on Emily's. She waited for the brunette to tell her no. She waited to hear the words, but Emily didn't say anything. She just quietly wept as she held a dying girl in her arms.

Courtney ghosted her lips over Emily's, tempted to taste her again, to feel her. But at the last moment she pulled away. She could feel Emily shaking. And she knew it wasn't right.

Emily hadn't said yes.

Consent. That's what Alison had called it. She'd heard the word before, but she never understood it.

But she understood that she'd hurt Emily. Alison was right.

Never again.

"I promised." Courtney whispered. "I won't hurt you…"

Emily dropped her chin and let out a strangled cry, her tears coating Courtney's cheeks.

Courtney's mouth dropped open and her chest seized as she tried to draw in a labored breath. She looked at Emily. She seemed to understand that she was dying. Her lungs were filling with blood. How poetic, a swimmer who would die drowning on dry land.

"I'm scared." She stared towards the sky, her gaze fixed. "Am I going to hell?"

"No. No, of course not."

"You're a bad liar." Tears streaked the side of her face. "You deserved the world, and I set that world on fire. I wish…I wish I could go back."

Emily could see the light fading in her eyes.

"Look at me." Emily grasped her face. "You have to hold on. Your brother…"

"I think this is right." Courtney cut her off.

She was dying, but she wouldn't want to be anywhere else in the world.

She was with Emily.

Her Emily.

"Being with you is enough." She'd never understood that until now. Every moment with Emily was a blessing.

She closed her eyes, shivering from the cold. But the cold only accentuated the warmth of Emily's body.

Courtney purred under her breath as she slowly faded from consciousness.

"Mmm, you're warm. So warm." Not cold. Not like her. Emily had always been warm. In every way. "I love you. I want you to know that. I really did love you."

"Courtney…"

"Do you hear that?" Courtney interrupted her.

Emily looked up, wondering if she was so lost in the shock that she'd missed someone approaching…anyone. Anyone that could help her.

"What?" Emily asked.

"It's quiet." It looked like she was trying to smile. "It's nice."

No noises. No bad thoughts.

Just Emily.

It was an overwhelmingly peaceful feeling.

"I did what I could. I tried. I tried my best," she muttered, glancing at Emily, her cold gaze now ablaze with a fire that Emily had never seen before. "Am I good? Am I good now?"

Emily nodded, choking back a cry. Why was she crying for a girl who had tormented her? She hated herself.

"Emily…please…" Courtney's eyes said everything that she couldn't say out loud,

Lie to me.

"You're good, Courtney." She cupped her cheek, nodding furiously through her tears.

It was a lie. But it was the best kind of lie. It was a beautiful lie. Her sacrifice didn't erase all the horrid things that she'd done, but it had been a kindness that she could offer. It was a compassion that she could give to her, if not for Courtney, at least for Isaac.

"You're good."

It was the last thing Courtney heard before her heart, the heart she'd never understood, stopped. She had gone her entire life believing her heart couldn't feel anything. It was only when she felt it breaking that she realized just how fragile it was, and just how important it was that it had always fully belonged to Emily Fields.


A/N: You can let out that breath you've been holding in now.